My Antonia Read online

  I

  I HAD BEEN LIVING with my grandfather for nearly three years when hedecided to move to Black Hawk. He and grandmother were getting old forthe heavy work of a farm, and as I was now thirteen they thought I oughtto be going to school. Accordingly our homestead was rented to 'thatgood woman, the Widow Steavens,' and her bachelor brother, and we boughtPreacher White's house, at the north end of Black Hawk. This was thefirst town house one passed driving in from the farm, a landmark whichtold country people their long ride was over.

  We were to move to Black Hawk in March, and as soon as grandfather hadfixed the date he let Jake and Otto know of his intention. Otto said hewould not be likely to find another place that suited him so well; thathe was tired of farming and thought he would go back to what he calledthe 'wild West.' Jake Marpole, lured by Otto's stories of adventure,decided to go with him. We did our best to dissuade Jake. He was sohandicapped by illiteracy and by his trusting disposition that hewould be an easy prey to sharpers. Grandmother begged him to stay amongkindly, Christian people, where he was known; but there was no reasoningwith him. He wanted to be a prospector. He thought a silver mine waswaiting for him in Colorado.

  Jake and Otto served us to the last. They moved us into town, putdown the carpets in our new house, made shelves and cupboards forgrandmother's kitchen, and seemed loath to leave us. But at last theywent, without warning. Those two fellows had been faithful to us throughsun and storm, had given us things that cannot be bought in any marketin the world. With me they had been like older brothers; had restrainedtheir speech and manners out of care for me, and given me so much goodcomradeship. Now they got on the westbound train one morning, in theirSunday clothes, with their oilcloth valises--and I never saw them again.Months afterward we got a card from Otto, saying that Jake had been downwith mountain fever, but now they were both working in the Yankee GirlMine, and were doing well. I wrote to them at that address, but myletter was returned to me, 'Unclaimed.' After that we never heard fromthem.

  Black Hawk, the new world in which we had come to live, was a clean,well-planted little prairie town, with white fences and good greenyards about the dwellings, wide, dusty streets, and shapely little treesgrowing along the wooden sidewalks. In the centre of the town therewere two rows of new brick 'store' buildings, a brick schoolhouse, thecourt-house, and four white churches. Our own house looked down over thetown, and from our upstairs windows we could see the winding line ofthe river bluffs, two miles south of us. That river was to be mycompensation for the lost freedom of the farming country.

  We came to Black Hawk in March, and by the end of April we felt liketown people. Grandfather was a deacon in the new Baptist Church,grandmother was busy with church suppers and missionary societies, and Iwas quite another boy, or thought I was. Suddenly put down among boys ofmy own age, I found I had a great deal to learn. Before the spring termof school was over, I could fight, play 'keeps,' tease the little girls,and use forbidden words as well as any boy in my class. I was restrainedfrom utter savagery only by the fact that Mrs. Harling, our nearestneighbour, kept an eye on me, and if my behaviour went beyond certainbounds I was not permitted to come into her yard or to play with herjolly children.

  We saw more of our country neighbours now than when we lived on thefarm. Our house was a convenient stopping-place for them. We had a bigbarn where the farmers could put up their teams, and their womenfolkmore often accompanied them, now that they could stay with us fordinner, and rest and set their bonnets right before they went shopping.The more our house was like a country hotel, the better I liked it.I was glad, when I came home from school at noon, to see a farm-wagonstanding in the back yard, and I was always ready to run downtown toget beefsteak or baker's bread for unexpected company. All through thatfirst spring and summer I kept hoping that Ambrosch would bring Antoniaand Yulka to see our new house. I wanted to show them our red plushfurniture, and the trumpet-blowing cherubs the German paperhanger hadput on our parlour ceiling.

  When Ambrosch came to town, however, he came alone, and though he puthis horses in our barn, he would never stay for dinner, or tell usanything about his mother and sisters. If we ran out and questioned himas he was slipping through the yard, he would merely work his shouldersabout in his coat and say, 'They all right, I guess.'

  Mrs. Steavens, who now lived on our farm, grew as fond of Antonia aswe had been, and always brought us news of her. All through the wheatseason, she told us, Ambrosch hired his sister out like a man, and shewent from farm to farm, binding sheaves or working with the threshers.The farmers liked her and were kind to her; said they would rather haveher for a hand than Ambrosch. When fall came she was to husk corn forthe neighbours until Christmas, as she had done the year before; butgrandmother saved her from this by getting her a place to work with ourneighbours, the Harlings.