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WE WERE WALKING SOUTH this morning as the sun started to rise. The sun’s pink in the east horizon faded to blue as we left Salina. A trace of the moon was still visible in the sky. No more than a slight breeze stirred the air. My skirt absorbed the dew from the knee-high grass until I could wring water out of it like a newly washed garment. It felt like it was going to be a cool morning, but it quickly changed as the sun continued to rise.
Then we turned southwest, following a faint trail of bent grass. As the first hour of walking went into the second, a slight breeze stirred in our path. We spend time listening to the rhythm of our steps, the rumble of the wagons, the chatter of young children. We hear the murmur of couples talking, dreaming out loud of the new land we will see in a few hours.
What will our new land look like? Will we be lucky enough to have trees? Tall lush grass would point to the fertile soil below. What if we are unlucky in our choice? Can we trade the acreage for a different one? What if it is covered with rocks? How do we know we didn’t pick something that is untillable?
How long will it take to build our dugout? We’ll be living on the open prairie under the elements until it is completed. We will be sharing a plow with other farmers because most of us can’t afford everything at once. How long will it take to turn sod so we can plant our first crop?
According to the map, we don’t have any water running on our place. How deep will we have to dig the well to find the water?
Will we be able to live off the land when our store-bought supplies run out?
As we stop for a rest, I gaze to the southwest for the landmark that will announce our new home. On our first break, the Smoky Buttes were not yet visible, but the second stop’s location gave us a view of hazy blue hills in the distance. Two fellow Swedes that came to Salina to help our arrival talk regarding the size of acres and what they have done to their new patches, but it hasn’t satisfied my curiosity about the feel and scent of the soil. I’m getting very anxious to end this twelve-mile walk.
The morning’s clouds dissipate in an eternal blue sky. Sweat runs down under my sunbonnet as we trudge through the maze of grass. The morning sun is not in my eyes, but it heats up my dark clothing. The breeze that softly moves over the grass is not strong enough to dry my back. Most of the time my eyes are looking forward, or down to watch my path. Occasionally I glance to the west, looking at the buttes.
Then the shadowed hills of gray rise from the prairie floor. Although the heat has risen, so has our pace. Our new lives are waiting for us at the base of what we can see in the distance.
Then the shaded hills turn a bright green. The group stops again to stare at the change of scenery. The younger children are oblivious to us. They don’t know that they are playing in the shadow of their new home, which they will inherit when their generation grows up.
Will Oscar remember his first look at the Buttes when this land becomes his?
Families break away from our group as they find their land. Three families stop on their section, and we move to the next section west.
“The land agent says this is ours? How can we tell?”
Our belongings are in another farmer’s wagon. They are unloaded and piled on a bed of grass. We’re standing on a level rise just east of a gap in the buttes. There is a gradual slope to the south. It blends in with the rest of the blowing grass. There are no roads, trails, or signs marking a visible boundary around what has become our eighty acres of land.
Our land. It slips off my tongue so easily. Our property, what we own in America.
The wind has picked up to become a constant siege. It whips my skirts between my legs, making it hard to walk. Emilia holds her arms out for balance. Her fingertips touch the grass that comes up to her waist. It is only the first of June. Another month and the grass will swallow her entirely.
“Well, what do you think Charlotta? Have we made a good choice?”
How do I feel about this land? As yet it is foreign to me, though similar to all the miles of prairie we have crossed over the last four hundred and fifty miles. What makes this land special? I close my eyes and listen with my senses. Samuel and the children are silent, looking to me for the answer. At first, I hear nothing but silence, but then the earth opens up. The wind whistles through the grass, a bird calls a short melody, even though there is not a tree in sight. The drone of insects rises as they go about their business. The damp soil gives off a rich earthy smell of moisture and life. The scents of pollinating grasses and wildflowers drift in and out of the air current as the wind blows them to me. I push back my sunbonnet to feel the wind blow wisps of hair around my temples while it dries the perspiration on my face.
I realize it has been a long time since I felt relaxed and at peace in my soul. We are finally at the end of our journey. I open my eyes to study the land in detail. It slowly comes to me that this is our grass, our soil, and our piece of earth, to take care of as long as we are able.
“Look at our new land, children.”
I try to pull up a tuft of native grass, but its roots are too deep in the soil. Beetles scurry for shelter after I disturb their hiding place. The pungent scent of yarrow arises when Oscar breaks off white flower heads from the soft mass of fronds. Emilia sneezes after shaking a stem of yellow clover that is as tall as she is. Golden honeybees effortlessly lift from one flower blossom to another to gather the rich nectar. Tiny plants two inches high are blooming just as well as the other wildflowers mixed in the grass. From a distance, it looks like the only plant growing is grass, but closer examination reveals a culture unique to the prairie.
Our land. One part of the span of grass will yield rows of ripe golden grains. Another section will become our cluster of buildings. And a part will be left as native prairie to cut for winter forage. Even in its natural state, it can provide food.
Samuel scrapes his boot heel into the moist earth to loosen the soil. Hunching down, he gathers a handful, squeezing it in his hand to feel the texture. The children move in close to see what will appear when he opens his hand. Tiny hands pull open Samuel’s large fingers to see inside. He patiently explains that this very soil which we moved to America to find, will feed us and our livestock from now on. Josefina, whom I perch on my knee in front of Samuel, instinctively grabs at the soil to stuff it in her mouth. The children will be a part of this soil as much as we are.
We find the marker on the northwest corner and turn south. The range of buttes continues on the right side of us as far south as we can see. The two hills closest to us are about a mile away. We walk south down a slight slope to find the next marker.
Samuel hikes away from us, head fixed due south, counting his long strides. The land agent told him to look for the next marker at about a thousand steps from the first. The panoramic sky dwarfs the children and me as we meander down to meet him. Oscar and Emilia run, stop and inspect a buffalo skull, then dart to something else. I stroll down with Josefina on my hip, relaxed to see my family together on our land. Although it took a year longer than we planned, we are finally ready to plant our dreams in the soil of this prairie.
Samuel finds the two south points, and we head back up the slope to the northeast corner. I pull a linen bag from our food basket. Our parents sent this sack with Mathilda, instructing us not to open it until the day we arrived on our new land. We do not know what the hard thing in the sack is, but it is so crucial that Mathilda carried it all the way from Sweden.
Inside, wrapped in paper, is a small packet of rye seed and a half-loaf of rock-hard bread. It puzzles us until I realize by its shape that it is the såkaka, the Christmas bread. Grain from the last sheaf of rye harvested from the field is ground into meal to bake this loaf. It has a place of honor on the Christmas table but is not eaten. It is wrapped and stored away until spring. When the earth warms up the soil for spring planting, the hard, dry bread is pounded into bits. The crumbs are fed to the man and beast that are going to plant the new crop, and the rest is mixed with the seed that is being planted back into the earth. This magic food gives all involved the strength and vigor to start the new cycle of life.
This loaf was made from grain raised in Kulla on Samuel’s ancestors’ land. The grain was harvested by my fader and baked by my moder. They kept half the loaf to bless their spring crop and sent the other to us for good luck.
From one generation’s homestead in Sweden, begins the next generation’s farm in America.
I break off little pieces of bread for each of us to eat as symbols of the planter. We’ll need strength and prayers to turn this prairie into a home.
At the northeast corner of our new land, the one closest to Sweden, Samuel pushes our new shovel into the ground and turns the first scoop of soil. Mixing some rubbed-off breadcrumbs with the rye, I plant the seeds in the fresh-turned earth. Their Swedish roots will grow in American soil, just as our family plans to do.
When we come to this spot to check the rye’s growth we can look toward the east to where we, and this blessing, came from—our parents and our native country of Sweden.
~*~*~*~*~
Cultivating Hope, Book 2
DESCRIPTION
Can you imagine being isolated in the middle of treeless grassland with only a dirt roof over your head? Having to feed your children with whatever wild plants or animals you could find living on the prairie?
Sweating to plow the sod, plant the seed, cultivate the crop—only to lose it all by a hailstorm right before you harvest it?
This second book in the Planting Dreams series portrays Swedish immigrant Charlotta Johnson as she and her husband build a farmstead on the Kansas prairie.
This family faced countless challenges as they homestead on America’s Great Plains during the 1800's. Years of hard work develop the land and improve the quality of life for her family- but not with a price.
Readers compare Hubalek’s books as a combination of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie books, The Emigrants series by Vilhelm Moberg, and a Willa Cather novel.
Chapter 1 of Cultivating Hope
1869—Hoeing Sunburn
I dip my callused hands into the basin and splash water on my hot, swollen face. The bucket of water is warm, not the cold and refreshing sensation I long for. It is sitting on a bench beside the dugout door and has absorbed the day’s heat. I feel both relief and a stab of pain. My skin is parched from sunburn and wind, and the water stings my face instead of cooling it.
The wind whirls up without warning and snatches the head scarf that I have just taken off. It whips through the air, caught in a whirlwind, circling up and down in the tiny funnel of air. I chase after the scarf as it hops and skips across the prairie before being snagged on a clump of grass. Wearily I retrieve the bit of cloth and wrap it around my head again. My callused fingers fumble with a knot that will hold against the wind.
I am blistered from head to toe. Every movement hurts, yet I have no choice but to keep going until my muscles harden or give out. My eyes sting from squinting in the sun and wind. My dainty traveling gloves wore out when we were digging the dugout. From the pain, I think the blister on my right little toe has become cracked and bloody.
And I’m not done for the day. I just came in to check the children and get a drink of water. There is so much to do, and for the time being, I’m the only one here to do it.
Because of the expense of building our farmstead, Samuel has taken a job. It is both a trade-off and a standstill because it is time away from the fieldwork. Both jobs need to be done, but neither can be performed without the other. The farm will not produce the money we need until we plow and plant it. But we can’t afford the equipment or seed until we have money available.
At least there is help nearby if I need it. Although our group that traveled together from Illinois is spread across the prairie, someone is always within walking distance. But it is hard to visit neighbors because I would have three small children in tow. I don’t have a horse and wagon for transportation.
Members of our church group banded together to provide help and share expenses. Rather than all the men leaving at once, neighbors have united as a team on both the farm and the railroad job. Two men leave home to labor while the third takes his turn working on his farm and watching over the other two families. None of us can afford oxen and equipment by ourselves, but together we can by sharing the cost and the time. Now it’s Samuel’s turn to be gone. He is somewhere out in western Kansas building the railroad bed heading across America.
So, I’m here alone with three children to feed and an acreage that is fighting change. I can’t seem to get much done besides taking care of the children, but time must be spent hoeing the garden and the field. We were late planting, and production isn’t as far along as I had hoped, so I need to help the plants as much as I can. My primary goal is to get the vegetables that are growing next to the dugout harvested, dried, and hung in burlap sacks from the dugout ceiling.
I’m impatient to see progress in our work and sweat. I can’t expect much in only a few months’ time, but I need to feel that I have accomplished something on this farm other than merely surviving. We have planted very little of our eighty acres except for the garden and a small patch of corn. Neighbors worked together to build shelters for everyone. This winter we’ll have to survive on hunting and the vegetables I harvest from the garden. We don’t have our own animals yet, so we don’t have to worry about winter feed for livestock.
Some days I hate this land. I want it to change its ways for me, but instead, it fights back. The prairie doesn’t plan to be captured and tamed. I pray for rain but instead the sun bakes the ground I’m trying to nurture. When nature does send moisture, it has been in the form of thunderclouds that can bring high wind and hail.
I’m afraid that I’m stuck with it, no matter what the outcome or the hardship it brings. We can’t afford to buy what we need to make life comfortable. Our lives have to be sustained by this land.
At times I yearn to go home. Life was tough in Sweden, but at least we had a roof over our heads, a cow to milk, and family near us. It doesn’t bother me when I’m out working on the land, but it weighs on me at night when I’m tired and discouraged.
We were so optimistic our first week on this land because we could only improve our situation. I soon found out that nothing could be worse than arriving on the empty prairie with no shelter and limited supplies. Living in a tent grew tedious. The constant struggle wore us down. The relentless wind tested my spirit and tired the children. Before the dugout was done, I was ready to crawl into the uncompleted hole to hide from the wind and sun.
The grass where our home was to be built was clipped, then the ground cut into sod bricks and laid aside for the roof. It was difficult digging up the prairie sod. The roots fought the shovel and break plow because they had been growing for generations before we cut into it. But that made a good solid brick because, in the early summer, the moist soil is thick with new roots. Samuel commented that sod bricks cut during the fall would have been dry, crumbly, and more apt to undermine the construction. Once the hole was dug, sandstone gathered from the buttes was used to reinforce the walls. Next, we hardened the sides and dirt floor with a mixture of water, clay, and salt. The men made trips to the river east of us to find trees for ridge poles and limbs for rafters. No one could spare sawed lumber for roof beams.
The sod bricks were laid around the perimeter to add more height to the walls, and a single layer was placed on top of our makeshift rafters of dried grass and branches. Samuel stood one tree trunk under the ridge pole in the middle of the room to support the weight of the roof. The position of the support is inconvenient, but I prefer that to having the sod cave in on us.
A vent pipe for a stove was installed when we laid the dugout roof. I hope to have a little cooking stove inside the dugout before the first cold blast hits the plains this winter. For now, I prepare our meals outside in a rock-lined pit that I can only use when the wind is not blowing. So far this summer, we have had more cold meals that hot.
When it was my turn at the shovel, I complained about digging such a big hole, but now I wish we had made it larger. We didn’t have many possessions to store, but they filled up the hole quickly when we added our makeshift furniture.
Our new home felt dark and close at first with only the single door and the small windowpane on the west. I felt like a trapped animal because there was no way out if something should happen and the single entrance was blocked. Now, most days I feel secure in the dugout because it is away from the openness of the prairie sky.
The main thing I have had to get used to is the dirt. When it is hot and dry, dust covers food and bedding alike. When it rains, the roof leaks and everything is splattered with the dripping mud. No matter how much I try to keep my little home clean, it will never honestly feel that way.
The main need on our farm now is water. I didn’t realize how much of it our family used for drinking and washing until we didn’t have a handy source. We took well water for granted in Sweden and Illinois. Now our water is hauled from a creek a quarter mile away. We have a barrel to store it inside by the door and another outside on the corner of our shelter that catches rainwater. The men are working together to dig a well for each homestead. Until it is our turn, I have to be patient for a convenient water supply.
It took a while to become accustomed to the heat, not only the temperature but the humidity. We thought the weather would be the same as in Illinois, but it is different in Kansas. Here there are no rows of trees to slow down or buffer the force of the wind.
There is so much about the Great Plains and its inhabitants that we don’t know. And the only way to learn is by living with it.
I pick up the hoe and head back to the garden. The prairie is threatening to overtake my work.
The tiny glow of the burning feather in the bowl of tallow makes an effort to shine past the edge of the table. Its shadow barely lights our belongings that clutter the walls and floor space of the dugout.
The makeshift table is but wooden grocery crates stacked together. Two cracker barrels are our only chairs. If both Samuel and I are present for a meal, the children stand to eat. Eventually, Samuel plans to make more chairs, even if they are tree stumps cut down from the riverbed.
More crates stacked four high with their open ends outline the north wall and serve as shelves. Every time we have purchased crackers or the like, I’ve kept the tin, just to have containers to hold our food staples. Flour and meal will be spoiled if left open to pests. Another box contains our plates, cups, and silverware, many of which Samuel carved out of wood. Baking utensils and pans take up another. Personal items, like the brush and comb, lie on top of the stack. I had our few books there until the first night’s rain soaked the covers.
I hung my framed embroidery sampler of the Swedish table prayer at eye level on the wall to remind me of our Swedish past. A small strip of oilcloth is draped over the top of the frame to protect it.
The only other picture displayed is an illustration of a two story house I cut out of a magazine and pasted on a piece of cardboard. It’s my goal to someday be out of this dugout and into a home like the one pictured. To me, an American-style home is the image of success. A real farmhouse would mean that our hard work paid off on this homestead adventure. But at the rate we are going, I wonder how many years before I walk through its front door?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
THE WOODEN TRUNK THAT traveled with us from Sweden is against the east wall. Our winter clothes and extra bedding are folded in there along with anything we don’t want to have investigated by the vermin that plague our underground home.
Whenever I look at it, our name and destination carved into the front of the trunk remind me of our voyage. It is still hard to imagine the thousands of miles that it and our family have traveled in the past year and a half.
My wedding chest is wrapped in a gunny sack and tucked in a hole dug under the bed. It holds our money, important papers, and my jewelry. We can’t risk having our savings stolen by thieves or losing our land documents in a prairie fire. It is hidden from sight by a layer of dirt and a board on top of it, but either one of us can get to it in a hurry if we need to, or leave it hidden if we have to flee.
Cloth bags of beans and dried fruit we brought with us from our Illinois farm hang from the corners of the ceiling. Two months from now I hope to have so much food hanging from the rafters that we have to duck our heads as we walk around the room.
Oscar sighs in his sleep. He is sprawled across his floor mat in front of the trunk. His arms are flung over his head, and his feet reach almost past the bottom of the mat. He is growing so fast. I should have made the mattress larger, to begin with.
The girls lie curled up facing each other on the big primitive bed that is perched against the south wall. Tonight they were so tired they sunk down into the prairie hay ticking without a word of protest. Emily’s left leg twitches upward, then relaxes. I hope bedbugs and fleas don’t wake them so we can have a good night’s sleep. Josefina’s thumb almost falls out of her mouth until by habit she sucks it back in.
Our meager summer clothing hangs on the wall when it isn’t on our backs. I take my nightgown off the buffalo horn wedged between two wall stones and replace it with the dress that I just took off.
I dip the washcloth in a bowl of dingy water, wring out the excess, and wipe the sweat from my face and chest. Oh, how I long for a cool clean bath in a tub I’ve used the same water to wash the children earlier, and it smells of dirt.
My skin itches when I rub across the mosquito and chigger bites that cover my body. Something is crawling up my neck. I wipe it off with the cloth and hold it up to the light. Another tick. I flick it into the hot flame and watch it sizzle.
Out of learned habit, I shake my grimy nightgown before pulling it over my head, and three miller moths flutter away from their hiding place.
I give a quick blow to snuff out the burning feather. It is pitch black for a few moments until my eyes adjust to the light that is coming through the little window. Two steps from the table and I ease into bed beside the girls.
Sleep eludes me as I think of things I did and did not do today. I can’t get the thoughts of work out of my head. It has been another exhausting day trying to make progress on our land. Tossing and turning just makes the narrow stone walls of the dugout close in tighter. I stare at the ceiling. Dirt falls down in the moonlight onto my uncovered feet. Now that the room is quiet from the family’s activities, the rodents are busy overhead.
My eye catches the moonlit handle of the hoe that is leaning in the southwest corner. The hand tool is always standing by the door because I never leave the dugout without it. The worst terror I have had to face on the prairie so far is the snakes silently slithering in the grass. They are so thick that I’ve lost count of how many I have killed this summer. And after you kill one, you must be on the lookout for its mate. More than once I’ve found a rattlesnake sunning itself in front of the dugout, and I’ve had to hack it to death and toss it out of the way to get in the door.
The shovel beside it dug out this home and has turned over countless cuts of sod to expose native soil for the garden. After only two months the metal point is dull and needs to be sharpened again. The tools we had packed for the voyage and the few we accumulated in Illinois are also stashed there. Samuel hung the ax and the guns over the door to keep them out of the children’s reach but still handy for us.
It has grown stuffy inside, and I need air. I crawl out of bed, pick up the hoe, and ease outside. I pause to leave the door open to hear the children, but then shut it behind me, so no nocturnal creature slips in unnoticed.
Ah, relief flows through my thin cotton shift as the breeze touches my skin. Such a contrast. I’m hot and cramped for space inside the dugout, but outside there is no boundary.
The wet grass glistens in the moonlight. Earlier this evening we had a gentle rain that cooled the heat of the day. It came so softly that I smelled it before I heard it, and for a change, it brought no wind with it. The rain may make high humidity tomorrow, but tonight it feels heavenly.
I lean against the hump of the dugout to stare at the night sky. Its dampness soaks through to my skin. I’d love to go for a stroll but don’t dare take the chance. There aren’t defined country roads like there were in Sweden or Illinois. The dugout blends in so well with the scenery that I could get lost in the dark. With no landmarks visible I couldn’t rely on my sense of direction. The light would show through the dugout window if I lit it, but there would be danger leaving it lit with sleeping children inside. And what would happen to my little family if something happened to me?
I walk around the dugout twice, then settle back to watch the heavens. I rub my abdomen. I must take care of myself for another reason, too. My tiredness isn’t being caused by the workload only. Samuel doesn’t know it yet, but we’ll have another mouth to feed this spring.
The last wisps of clouds pass the full moon and open the sky to a brilliant display of thousands of tiny lights. The night light is so bright that I can see my shadow. Except for the dark contrast in the southwestern buttes, I can turn every direction and not see an obstacle on the horizon. I long to see the black silhouette of a single tree, but it will be years before that wish is fulfilled on this land.
I can’t help comparing the Kansas summer sky with Sweden’s. My parents and I gaze at the same star constellations but in different skies. The moon rises here in the evening around eight o’clock during the summer. In my homeland the sun would stay up past midnight, giving the moon only a few hours in the sky.
My mind floods with memories when I think of the summer sky there. We always stayed up all night on Midsummer’s Eve to celebrate the return of the sun. The swaying birch trees in the evening breeze shaded friends and family sitting on blankets below. I can taste the feast spread among them: boiled crayfish, rye bread, and the first cherries of the season. The air, scented with fragrant purple lilac blooms and evergreen boughs, is filled with laughter. We celebrated the sun in Sweden. Here I’m thankful when the moon rises instead because it means the end of the workday, the heat, and the loneliness.
I consider “what if” situations in my head, and they bounce between continents and lifestyles. I must remember the reason we left Sweden, but I also wonder what would have happened if we had stayed. Letters from our parents tell us that waves of people are still leaving the county, so we were some of the first to leave in ‘68.
What if conditions turned around in Sweden? Then there would be fewer people and more land, and maybe we could have stayed. Of course, there were other problems to consider. People are leaving because of taxes and the church as well as the famine. Will it pay to be the first family to plow this patch of Kansas prairie? I smile when I think of the excitement of the first day on this land. To call eighty acres, our own went to our heads. Oh, the euphoria to finally be at our destination and know we had our own place. We knew it would be work, but we had high ambition. In some ways, we were naive because it is going to take more sweat and money than I imagined it would. The prairie has been here a long time, and it is resistant to change. Can we survive the five years it takes to prove up this claim?
The little sod we have tackled has been tough to plow and has re-rooted when given a chance. Corn seed planted has to share moisture with the grass growing around the tender stalk. The pumpkin vines weave among clumps of re-established blue stem grass. It will take more than one year to turn the fields into mellow soil.
The prairie calls me back to the land. Crickets and locust vocalize their tunes with the toads. Fireflies blink on and off as they float in the darkness. Mosquitoes persistently buzz in my ears no matter how I try to swat them away. A prairie wolf calls to another in the far distance; together they echo back and forth. The grass is silent because it is heavy with rain. I hate to say it, but tonight I miss the wind.
I scan the sky to search the stars, but a movement from the north catches my eye. I can’t figure out how close it is, but I imagine an animal is foraging for an evening meal. Several species look for food during the cooler evening hours.
I look back to the north and realize it is a human walking across the prairie. I crouch down beside the dugout, so my lone figure doesn’t show. Our home is so low to the ground that a person could walk right by it and not realize it is there.
Who would be traveling at night? Usually, a person would stop to sleep unless he wanted to travel while the air is cooler-or to be unnoticed. I don’t know if he is a kind soul lost on the prairie or a thief in the night.
I don’t think it is an Indian. We’ve seen them travel along the creeks now and then. They haven’t threatened anyone in our group but have learned to recognize our dugouts as sources of food. Settlers in other parts of the state have been attacked by Indians when they have resisted, so a few stolen biscuits is a sacrifice I’m willing to make.
I see the flat top and brim of a hat on the man. I hold my breath. I’m more scared of the Texas cowboy than I am of the native.
The man stops. The brim of the hat points up, apparently looking up to the stars to find his direction. Now he is changing the angle of his path. Can he smell the remnants of tonight’s cook fire? Does bright moonlight betray our dugout’s outline?
My chest is pounding so hard he can probably hear my heartbeat over the sound of the crickets. Should I go inside and • barricade the door, hoping the traveler doesn’t see our home?
This is the first time that Samuel and I have been apart during our seven-year marriage. During the second night alone, I had panicked after hearing sounds outside the dugout door. I’ve always had my father or husband to protect me. It terrified me when I realized I was in charge of guarding my family. I spent the rest of the night sitting up at the foot of the bed with the shotgun in my lap and my sleeping children behind me.
I peek over the dugout. There is something familiar about the rhythm of the stranger’s walk, the way his shoulder slants as his carries his baggage. I know that gait and stature. It’s Samuel! He must have traded off work with someone, taken the train back to Salina, and decided to walk home tonight.
“Samuel! Samuel!”
I wait for him to answer or at least turn this way, but he keeps walking. He is about fifty yards away and must not have heard my hoarse voice above the din of the prairie life.
Can he find our dugout by himself? He has made it this far, but I’d hate for him to walk past me. I consider crawling to the top of the dugout to stand up higher, but I’m not sure that the roof has settled enough to hold my weight. I’d hate to fall in on top of a sleeping child and then still have Samuel walk past our crushed family.
On an impulse, I pull off my nightgown, wave it in the air, and yell again. Samuel stops to stare at the flash of white. He waves back with his hat. Now he knows the prairie location of his family and home.
Then I wait, wrapped in the prairie moonlight, for the arms of my husband.
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