THE first deep snow of the winter, dropping gently from a wide, dun sky, rested in white folds on the new straw roofs of the sod buildings, crested the low stacks that had been hauled from distant meadows not swept by the fire, covered the cinder-strewn gaps in the yard where the granaries had stood, and hid under a shining, jeweled pall the stripped fields and the somber prairie. The little girl's mother, stringing pop-corn in the kitchen for the Christmas tree at the school-house, looked out toward noon to see the farm restored, as if by enchantment, to the aspect of other and happier winters; and sorrowfully welcomed the winding-sheet that gave promise of the coming resurrection, when the grass and flowers should rise again from out the naked, charred ground, bright and glorious with the fresh-born spring.
It had seemed to her, ever since the terrible holocaust of a few months before, as if the Bad Lands had moved eastward upon them. Yet, however sad was the sight of their loss and the sense of their privation, she counseled against selling out at a small figure and moving to some State where prairie fires were unknown, and bravely determined to stay and fight back to rough comfort and plenty.
"The snow will help us to forget," she said to the biggest brother, as she took a hot, crammed popper from him and emptied it into a milk-pan. He nodded in reply, and sprinkled the popper with kernels again, and she went back to her bench, carrying the pan under one arm. They sat without speaking, the click of the needle and the snapping of the corn alone breaking the quiet. When another popper was ready to be turned out, the biggest brother went into the adjoining shed with a wooden bucket and shoveled it full of coal from the ever-lessening pile that had been purchased, like the seed for the coming planting, on the promise of the next year's crop.
As he returned, bending under the weight of the bucket, the door into the entry was shoved slowly open and the little girl entered. She walked forward to lay her mittens on the table before she brushed the snow from her shoulders and leggings and untwisted and shook out her nubia. Her woolen cap was pulled far down over her ears, and her mother, as she watched her, did not see the grave eyes and pensive face until the little girl halted beside the biggest brother's chair to warm her hands at a stove-hole.
"How's the tree?" asked the biggest brother, putting down the bucket and depositing one small lump on the dying coals.
"It's setting in a churn," replied the little girl, without looking up.
"Is it trimmed?" said her mother.
The little girl acquiesced. "It's all ready to light."
"S'pose those Dutchman's young ones brought some things over to put on," ventured the biggest brother, shaking the popper violently to hide his concern.
The little girl sighed heavily. "Everybody's sent presents but the Swedes and us," she said, and there was a telltale break in her voice.