The First Four Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder

Author:Laura Ingalls Wilder [Wilder, Laura Ingalls]
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780060264260
Publisher: Harper & Row
Published: 1971-02-17T07:00:00+00:00

…angel bank

Come and around me stand,

Oh, bear me away on your snowy wings to—

She was being borne away on a wave of pain. A gust of cold, fresh air brought her back and she saw a tall man drop his snowy overcoat by the door and come toward her in the lamplight. She vaguely felt a cloth touch her face and smelled a keen odor. Then she drifted away into a blessed darkness where there was no pain. When Laura opened her eyes, the lamp was still shining brightly over the room, and Ma was bending over her with the doctor standing beside her. And in the bed by her side was a little warm bundle.

“See your little daughter, Laura! A beautiful baby, and she weighs just eight pounds,” Ma said.

“It’s a fine girl you are yourself,” Mrs. Power said from where she was sitting by the fire. “A fine, brave girl, and baby’ll be good because of it. You’ll be all right now.”

So Manly took the doctor and Mrs. Power home, but Ma stayed, and Laura went to sleep at once with her hand resting gently on little Rose. Rose was such a good baby, so strong and healthy that Ma stayed only a few days. Then Hattie Johnson came. “To wash baby this time, instead of windows,” she said. But soon Hattie went and the three, Manly, Laura, and Rose, were left by themselves in the little house atop the low hill with the sweep of the empty prairie all around it.

There was not a house near enough for neighbors, but a mile away across the slough a few buildings on the edge of town were in sight. A hundred precious dollars had gone for doctor bills and medicine and help through the summer and winter so far; but after all, a Rose in December was much rarer than a rose in June, and must be paid for accordingly.

Christmas was at hand and Rose was a grand present. Then the day before Christmas Manly hauled a load of hay to town and brought back the most beautiful clock. It stood nearly two feet high from its solid walnut base to the carved leaf at its very top. The glass door that covered the face was wreathed with a gilt vine on which four gilt birds fluttered, and the pendulum that swung to and fro behind them was the color of gold too. The clock had such a pleasant, cheerful voice as it said tick, tock, and when it struck the hours its tone was clear and sweet. Laura loved it at once.

The old round, nickel alarm clock could not be depended on to tell the right time, but still it would have answered the need, and Laura said doubtfully, “But ought you—” Then Manly told her he had traded the load of hay for it, and it would be a Christmas present for all three of them. The hay he had kept for feed was holding out so

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