. No
making was needed; the sun already had done that better than we could, and
we merely drove the mower through, after which I went back with the loaded
wagon, while Harry rode further out on to the prairie in search of another
sloo.

The mosquitoes came down in legions and bit us grievously, until it was
necessary to anoint our hair with kerosene. Our dwelling was stifling, so
that as a matter of necessity we always cooked outside; but the
temperature changed at sundown, and, lying full length on the
peppermint-scented hay, we rode home content across the darkening prairie,
which faded under the starlight into the semblance of a limitless dusky
sea, while the very stillness voiced its own message of infinity. Neither
of us would speak at such times. Harry had a turn for emotional sentiment,
I knew, but I too could feel that it was good to lie there motionless and
silent, and try to grasp its meaning. Then the strained sense of
expectancy would fade at the sight of the approaching homestead, or a
bronco blundering into a badger-hole would call us back to a work-a-day
world.

Harvest came, and that year there was neither drought nor untimely frost,
and our hearts grew light when the binders piled up a splendid crop.
Still, when we proposed to prepare a thanksgiving feast for all our
neighbors, Jasper, who had ridden over, grinned as he said, "Better lie
low and pay off that mortgage. You're only starting, and they wouldn't
expect it of you. Besides, you'll have had your fill of cooking before you
have finished with the thrashers."

This proved correct enough, for when the men came in with the thrasher and
the homestead vibrated to its hum, others whose harvests were garnered
came too, out of good-will, and Harry was cooking and baking all day long.
Sometimes for hours together they kept me busy beheading and plucking
fowls--we turned a steam jet on them from the engine to make the feathers
come off; and it amused me to wonder what Alice would think if she saw me
sitting, flecked all over with down, among the feathers, or Harry standing
grimed with dust and soot, peeling potatoes by the bucketful beside his
field kitchen. When the thrashers departed our larder and our henhouse
were empty, and the grocery bill long; but we were only sorry that we
could not entertain them more royally, for the men who worked for money at
so much the bushel and the men who worked for friendship vied with one
another in their labor, and