Cart-Wheels

By Lela McGuire Rustemeyer

A near blizzard howled through the John Day Valley in Eastern Oregon. Fine snow sifted through the cracks around the windows of the board-and-batten ranch house. Homemade curtains were tacked to the windowsills to keep everything inside snug and warm. In the corner of the kitchen a hot fire burned in the iron cook-stove, and the old black iron teakettle hummed as the steam from its spout drifted almost to the ceiling.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 7, 2005
• ISBN: 9781469123295

Lela McGuire Rustemeyer

Susan Quainton is a retired English teacher living in Washington, D.C. After gaining degrees from Mount Holyoke College and Oxford University, she spent nearly forty years as a Foreign Service spouse, during which time she also taught in high schools, elementary schools, and adult English language institutes both at home and abroad. She has lived in countries on five continents, where her husband served in U.S. Embassies, becoming Ambassador to the Central African Republic, Nicaragua, Kuwait, and Peru. The Quaintons have three children and seven grandchildren, who are among Lela’s great-great-grandchildren—the generation for whom these books have been prepared.

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Copyright © 2006 by Susan Long Quainton.

Library of Congress Number:          2005909194

ISBN:         Hardcover                     1-59926-965-1

                   Softcover                       1-59926-964-3

                   Ebook                            978-1-4691-2329-5

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CONTENTS

I   A LETTER FROM IDAHO

II   MR. McKAY

III   KEN

IV   A GIDDY WHIRL

V   A WEDDING AND A PARTING

VI   BY COACH, BY SLED, AND BY RAIL

VII   A LETTER TO LILLIE

VIII   A FRIGHT

IX   CAMAS PRAIRIE

X   ANOTHER LETTER TO LILLIE

XI   A DECISION

XII   COUNTRY DANCE ON CAMAS PRAIRIE

XIII   THE HOUSE WITH RED SHUTTERS

XIV   COTTONWOOD SCHOOL

XV   DEBATE

XVI   CAMPAIGNING

XVII   TELLING LILLIE

XVIII   CART-WHEELS

Editor’s Note

Notes

Glossary

List Of Illustrations

Cover:   Camas Prairie, Idaho

Photo:   Tony Carlson, White Bird Images

Papa, Lela, and Mama

At home in Prairie City, Oregon

Montgomery Ward Catalogue, 1898

Checking the Montgomery Ward order

Courtesy of the Chicago Public Library

Camas Prairie, Cottonwood Butte

Verner Dixon

Aunt Ruey and Uncle Jess Dixon

On the Banks of the Wabash Far Away

Over the Waves

I 

A LETTER FROM IDAHO

A near blizzard howled through the John Day Valley in Eastern Oregon. Fine snow sifted through the cracks around the windows of the board-and-batten ranch house. Homemade curtains were tacked to the windowsills to keep everything inside snug and warm. In the corner of the kitchen a hot fire burned in the iron cook-stove, and the old black iron teakettle hummed as the steam from its spout drifted almost to the ceiling.

At the end of the kitchen table Lela sat on a bench Papa had made. Her light brown hair tied back with a blue ribbon, she was chewing dreamily on her pencil. She was supposed to be doing her schoolwork, but she was thinking about Ken. From the very beginning of the school year she had noticed this tall, handsome newcomer among the 8th Reader pupils, and today she had had the definite feeling that his brown eyes had sought her blue ones, when both were meant to be looking at their lessons.

At the other end of the table, Mama stood making bread. Her red braids were pinned neatly around her head, and she wore a white apron with an inset of hand-knit lace over her blue-checked dress. With her sleeves rolled up to the elbows, she was stirring the dough with a wooden spoon in a big pan. Soon she would put the dough with its delicious smell of yeast to rise overnight, ready for making three loaves of light bread in the morning. Lela wondered if there was such a thing as heavy bread. If there were, she didn’t want to have any. They simply called yeast bread light bread, and, in the case of Mama’s, the description was certainly true.

Suddenly Lela sat up straight and began to listen anxiously to the conversation in the front room. Papa was arguing politics with Jess McMurdo, a miner who lived and worked on their ranch as a hired man in the winter.

Listen, Mama, they’re mad at each other, Lela said.

Nonsense, answered Mama, they never agree on politics, and the Free Silver question always gets them going.

Papa’s voice came from the other room, loud and harsh: You’re a fool; the President can’t do it alone.

"Never said he could, did I? But if he had the guts, he could get it done all the same. Don’t you go calling me a fool just ’cause I don’t agree with you. It’s a free country, ain’t it? If you think I’m not entitled to my opinion, then you’re a fool."

Mama, said Lela, hardly daring to breathe, they’re going to fight. Oh, I do wish they’d just talk sense, and then I might even understand what it’s all about.

Mama laughed gently. Don’t you bother your head about it. I’m sure I don’t, since women can’t vote anyway.

Lela insisted, But does ‘Free Silver’ mean they want the President to give silver away to everybody?

Of course not. It has something to do with minting silver dollars; at least I know that much.

From the other room, she heard Jess McMurdo say, Let’s forget it. There ain’t much we can do about it anyway, and gradually the voices quieted down. Lela was glad there wasn’t a fight, but she did love to hear about politics, and she decided that whether she could vote or not, she’d be a Democrat, because that’s what Papa was.

What with daydreaming and listening to Free Silver talk, Lela didn’t finish all her homework. She usually studied spelling as she walked to school, but next morning the snow was too deep for walking, and Papa got ready to take her to school on horseback.

Lela waited on the mounting block in front of the house till her father rode his horse alongside. He gave her his hand, and she jumped onto the horse behind the saddle, both legs modestly on one side. Papa had already put her books and lunch in the saddlebags. She put her arms around his waist and held on tight, tucking her face against his arm to keep out the freezing air. Papa’s breath froze into little icicles on his brown moustache. Breath from the horse frosted its nostrils.

Ever since she was a little girl, Papa had taken Lela to school on horseback whenever the snow was too deep for walking. When they arrived at school, he would lift her off the horse and hand her her books and lunch bucket. But today, Lela felt shyly self-conscious; maybe Ken was watching. She ran up the stairs to the warm schoolroom, where the other boys and girls were popping apple seeds on the hot stove. She was soon laughing and talking with the others, but she kept looking sidelong to see where Ken was. Once he caught her glance and she felt sure he had smiled at her; it was going to be a good day.

When the second bell rang, all the pupils quickly took their seats. Mr. Jarvis called the roll. Everyone present responded by repeating a verse from a well-known poet. Every morning the teacher gave out verses to be repeated the next day. This Friday, when Lela’s name was called, she stood up and said,

"You may break, you may shatter the vase, if you will,

But the scent of the roses will cling ’round it still."

As she sat down, she thought, That sounds like music, but why would anyone want to break a vase? After all the verses, one of the girls went over to the organ and played My Country ’Tis of Thee, while everyone stood up and sang.

Now lessons began. There were three grades in the room: 6th, 7th, and 8th Readers. Lela was in the 7th Reader, but she couldn’t help listening to the 8th Reader lesson, which was the first of the day. All the 8th Reader pupils marched down to the front of the room and sat on a long bench. Mr. Jarvis called each name, and that person had to stand and read aloud. They were doing Shakespeare, which seemed much more interesting than Lela’s lesson—the old Indian wars east of the Mississippi. But Lela had learned how to concentrate when other classes were reciting, since she had always gone to a school with several grades in one room. She got so engrossed in her reading that she was surprised when the bell rang for recess at ten-thirty.

Even though the snow was deep, everyone marched out. This was the one chance all morning to go to the boys’ and girls’ bathrooms—two outhouses at the bottom of the schoolyard. Soon there were two trails out to the privies worn in the snow. And even though there was no baseball or crack-the-whip out in the schoolyard, the wide porch, which wrapped all the way around the schoolhouse, made quite a good running track. Everyone was rosy-cheeked and breathless when recess was over and lessons began again.

Lunchtime came and went, and afternoon recitations went on until four o’clock. Lela had to be ready at the end of the schoolhouse porch as soon as school was dismissed, to meet Papa on his horse. When he came riding up, she handed him her books and lunch bucket and jumped up behind the saddle.

Some of the older boys who lived up the valley rode their own horses home, but most families had moved into town during the school session so that their children could walk to school. As the boys walked home, they turned up their coat collars against the cold, while the girls held their fascinators—crocheted scarves—tightly around their heads and necks. Papa and Lela rode slowly through town, since the snow had melted in the wagon tracks, and they didn’t want to splash mud on the boardwalk. They went along more briskly in the open country, where the snowdrifts stood high along the fences all the way to the ranch.

As Lela slid quickly to the mounting block at home, Papa handed her a letter. Give this to Mama, he said. She has been looking for it.

Lela put the letter into her coat pocket and ran to the back door. It opened into the summer kitchen, which in winter they called the storm kitchen, as it was a shelter against the cold and a storage place for firewood. Not wanting to stay one moment longer than necessary in the cold, Lela pulled off her muddy overshoes and burst into the warm kitchen beyond. Hurriedly she flung off her wraps, washed her hands, and sat down to the plate of hot food Mama had saved for her from the ranch dinner at noontime.

Mama, these short ribs and potatoes taste wonderful—my lunch was so cold the pie was frozen… but, she added hastily, so as not to hurt Mama’s feelings, you know I love it that way. It wasn’t until Lela was thoroughly well-fed and warm that she remembered the letter Papa had given her, still in her coat pocket, which she rather guiltily fetched and gave to Mama to read.

Mama sat down by the kitchen table and read the long letter, sent from her sister, Laruah Dixon (Ruey for short), in Cottonwood, Idaho. As she read, Papa came into the warm kitchen as well. He had pulled off his rubber boots and left them in the storm kitchen, walking inside in stocking feet, ready to put on the shoes that had been warming for him under the stove. Stamping his feet to get them warm, he said, Outside I felt as if Paradise was really lost, but it’s sure found again in this good warm kitchen. I’d like a cup of that hot coffee, Rovie, and he drank it before he even washed his cold and dirty hands.

Milas, said Mama, they want us to come to Idaho, near their place in Cottonwood. Sometimes I wish we could go… even though this is such a good home. Here’s the letter.

Papa took it and began to read. Lela kept quiet for a long while. Finally, she asked, Papa, is Cottonwood in a valley where we could look up to snow-capped mountains the way we can here?

No, Papa answered slowly. It is a little town about the size of Prairie City, but it’s on a wide, high prairie. You could likely see mountains with snow on them all year round, but they would be miles away.

Papa moved thoughtfully into the front room. He put a big log