Doris Free - A Harvest of Friends -Sample
Available Now!
Chapter 1. Little Doll Students
Doris sat sprawled on a worn patchwork quilt with her younger sister Arla. The
August sun filtered gently through the needles of the large pine tree overhead.
Their dolls were propped against a log that served as a makeshift school bench
for their tiny doll students. The girls had spent the whole afternoon getting
ready to play school. In front of each doll, they had placed a flat rock and a
sharpened stick, pretending it was a pencil and paper. Doris made the pencils by
carefully stripping the bark from straight willow sticks. Then she rubbed the
ends against a rough rock to form a point. Arla polished the pale sticks with
the bright red Indian paint flowers growing along the edge of the road to tint
them a perfect yellow-orange color, just like real painted pencils. To complete
their outdoor schoolroom, Doris nailed a wooden plank to the pine tree for a
chalkboard, and found a lump of coal to use as chalk.
After hours of preparation, the girls finally had everything just right and were
ready to start their pretend school day. Playing school was one of their
favorite summer pastimes, which always amused Ma, since they always spent the
entire school year longing for summer vacation.
Doris stood next to the old plank chalkboard and handed the lump of coal to her
sister. Her other hand was planted with force on her hip and her cheeks were
turning a flushed red. “Arla, you’re supposed to write on the board while I
teach the reading lesson.”
“But I don’t wanna just be quiet while you get to do all the talking. I don’t
like to write my ABC’s over and over again every time we play school.” Arla
stuck out her bottom lip in a well-practiced pout. She crossed her arms over her
chest, refusing to take the lump of coal to write on the board. A white rag
stretched from behind her neck to a loose knot on top of her head to push her
curly mop of brown hair out of her face. She shook her head from side to side,
flinging several escaped curls away from her blue eyes. Those same bright eyes
were locked with Doris’s and ready to fight.
Doris was not ready to give in to her younger sister.
At ten and seven, they were both equally stubborn and determined to have their
own way. Arla, as the youngest of the four Free sisters, was used to getting her
way more often than the others. Doris, on the other hand, had a strong sense of
what was fair and right. They both knew it really was Arla’s turn to write on
the board. This time, Doris was determined not to let Arla have her way.
The argument continued. Neither girl was successful in changing her stubborn
sibling’s mind. Words and tempers flew back and forth in the familiar quarrel.
Arla tried to reach an agreement with a change of tactics. “Why don’t we just
pretend its lunch time and we can eat our lunch?” Her stomach, which always
seemed to be empty, growled loudly as soon as she mentioned food.
The unrealistic argument did not sway Doris. She knew Arla's true goal was to
get more food into her belly and to avoid being quiet. “Because, we already ate
lunch hours ago. Then, shortly after that, you insisted it was snack time and we
ate all the apples we picked. We don’t have any food
left for a pretend lunchtime. And it is still your turn to
write on the board!”
Ma watched the girls from the kitchen window where she had just finished washing
her canning supplies. She had spent most of the day canning tomatoes and pickled
peppers with her two oldest girls Jena and Victoria. Doris and Arla helped pick
and wash the vegetables in the morning, and then Ma sent them out of the kitchen
to play. She had worried about the younger girls moving around the kitchen with
large boiling pots of water on the cook stove.
The play had turned to arguing as it did almost every time the girls played
school. The fun seemed to be in the planning and creation of the school items,
not in actually playing school. After everything was set up and ready,
they rarely agreed on anything. As always, Ma was ready with a distraction. She
had put a blackberry cobbler in the oven to cook slowly with the last of the
canning. Now it was ready. She scooped out two platefuls for Doris and Arla.
Jena and Victoria were already out on the back porch eating their cobbler and
listening to the younger girls’ argument. The kitchen was hot, and Ma was
relieved to get out and feel the cool breeze of fall in the small farming town
of Tomah, Wisconsin.
Neither Doris nor Arla noticed Ma coming toward them. They stood nose to nose
arguing the familiar old spat about teaching and writing. Smudges of dark coal
streaked Doris’s face where she pushed her straight brown hair behind her ears
with coal-smudged hands.
“My, those poor dolls are going to have to go through life without ever learning
to read or write with you two hoodlums for teachers. I don’t suppose you could
talk about all this after you finish your blackberry cobbler, could you?” Ma
raised her eyebrows in question. Her eyes sparkled with amusement but she held
back her smile.
Doris, determined to win this fight, would have kept arguing while the cobbler
got cold, but the ever-hungry Arla was calmed at the first mention of food. She
bounced excitedly over to Ma, snatched a plate and flopped on the quilt to eat
the sugary berries with a satisfied smile. Doris’ temper was much slower to cool
and her sister’s rapid end to the unsettled argument made her even angrier.
Ma expected this reaction from each of them. She calmly started a new
discussion, sure to distract Doris. “Come get your cobbler, Doris. You can eat
it while we talk about the workday we’re organizing for Winnie and Danny.”
At the mention of these special neighbors, Doris calmly sat with her cobbler and
listened to the plans. She had a special connection with the widow Winnie and
her orphaned nephew. When Winnie’s husband died, he had owed the townspeople
money. The people took out their revenge for all he owed them on the poor woman
and left her with so little she could hardly care for herself. When her
ten-year-old nephew, Danny, came to live with her after his parents died, Doris
met and befriended them both. After many secret attempts to help the odd pair,
Doris shared their plight with her family. With some quiet planning, the Free
family had pulled all the townspeople together to repair Winnie and Danny’s
run-down homestead and restore their crops and animals to them. None of these
events would have been set into motion without the kindness that started with
Doris.
Over the summer, Danny and Doris became even closer friends. They spent many
evenings walking under the stars together and often spent their Saturday
afternoons at Camel’s Hump Bluff for lazy picnics.
“As you both know, there’s still a lot of work to be done at Winnie and Danny’s
before winter comes. Winnie has taken care of the canning, and Danny has been a
wonder with all the new farm animals. But they need help in the fields with the
harvest and they also need more firewood to make it through the winter. The
first weekend in September, all the men in town will meet at the house to
complete the work. That is several weeks away but we have a lot to do on our own
farm, so I want to make sure the preparations are complete ahead of time. I need
you girls to help me plan a meal for all those hungry people. Winnie has some of
her garden produce set aside and I think she has some recipes in mind. You two
can walk over later this week and talk with Winnie to see what else we will
need. I’ll talk with the other women at church this weekend to finalize the
preparations.” Ma knew giving her youngest two girls a task they liked would
unite them again.
Doris and Arla nodded excitedly. They loved to visit Winnie and Danny. Most
likely, they would make an entire day of the visit if they could manage it.
Then, almost as an afterthought, Ma added, “A new family has moved into town,
the Walker family. We’ll meet them Sunday at church. They have two children who
are close to your age, so you’ll have some new friends in school this year. The
Walkers bought the Dime Store from the old Shutter family. Jane and Ed Shutter
moved down South by their daughter last month and I was worried the store would
close for good. I understand the Walkers will be adding many new items to the
store. We’re all excited to see what new things they will bring to Tomah.
They’re from Chicago, where things have moved much more rapidly than they have
in our little town.”
Doris finished her cobbler and handed the empty plate back to Ma. Arla had
finished her cobbler moments after she started. The girls both looked at the
dolls, still sitting primly and waiting for their lesson.
Ma knew returning to the game of school would carry the girls back to the same
disagreement. “It’s time for you girls to bring your dolls in for the night. It
looks like it might rain tomorrow and the rain would ruin their faces. It’ll be
dark soon. We can work on the last of our quilt top with the lantern.” Usually,
they saved the lantern oil for work on cold winter nights when dark came early.
It was a special pleasure to stay up late on a summer night. Of course, Ma knew
the girls were tired out after their long summer day and wouldn’t keep their
eyes open late enough to burn much oil.
