Laura snatched her up and hid her under the shawl. She ran panting against the angry wind and the sleet, all the way home. Ma started up, frightened, when she saw Laura.
“What is it! What is it? Tell me!” Ma said.
“Mr. Nelson didn’t go to town,” Laura answered. “But, oh, Ma—look.”
“What on earth?” said Ma.
“It’s Charlotte,” Laura said. “I—I stole her. I don’t care, Ma, I don’t care if I did!”
“There, there, don’t be so excited,” said Ma. “Come here and tell me all about it,” and she drew Laura down on her lap in the rocking chair.
They decided that it had not been wrong for Laura to take back Charlotte. It had been a terrible experience for Charlotte, but Laura had rescued her and Ma promised to make her as good as new.
Ma ripped off the torn hair and the bits of her mouth and her remaining eye and her face. They thawed Charlotte and wrung her out, and Ma washed her thoroughly clean and starched and ironed her while Laura chose from the scrap-bag a new, pale pink face for her and new button eyes.
That night when Laura went to bed she laid Charlotte in her box. Charlotte was clean and crisp, her red mouth smiled, her eyes shone black, and she had golden-brown yarn hair braided in two wee braids and tied with blue yarn bows.
Laura went to sleep cuddled against Mary under the patchwork comforters. The wind was howling and sleety rain beat on the roof. It was so cold that Laura and Mary pulled the comforters over their heads.
A terrific crash woke them. They were scared in the dark under the comforters. Then they heard a loud voice downstairs. It said: “I declare! I dropped that armful of wood, didn’t I?”
Ma was laughing, “You did that on purpose, Charles, to wake up the girls.”
Laura flew screaming out of bed and screaming down the ladder. She jumped into Pa’s arms, and so did Mary. Then what a racket of talking, laughing, jumping up and down!
Pa’s blue eyes twinkled. His hair stood straight up. He was wearing new, whole boots. He had walked two hundred miles from eastern Minnesota. He had walked from town in the night, in the storm. Now he was here!
“For shame, girls, in your nightgowns!” said Ma. “Go dress yourselves. Breakfast is almost ready.”
They dressed faster than ever before. They tumbled down the ladder and hugged Pa, and washed their hands and faces and hugged Pa, and smoothed their hair and hugged him. Jack waggled in circles and Carrie pounded the table with her spoon and sang, “Pa’s come home! Pa’s come home!”
At last they were all at the table. Pa said he had been too busy, toward the last, to write. He said, “They kept us humping on that thresher from before dawn till after dark. And when I could start home, I didn’t stop to write. I didn’t bring any presents, either, but
I’ve got money to buy them.”
“The best present you could bring us, Charles, was coming home,” Ma told him.
After breakfast Pa went to see the stock. They all went with him and Jack stayed close at his heels. Pa was pleased that Sam and David and Spot looked so well. He said he couldn’t have taken better care of everything, himself. Ma told him that Mary and Laura had been a great help to her.
“Gosh!” Pa said. “It’s good to be home.” Then he asked, “What’s the matter with your feet, Laura?”
She had forgotten her feet. She could walk without limping when she remembered to. She said, “My shoes hurt, Pa.”
In the house, Pa sat down and took Carrie on his knee. Then he reached down and felt of Laura’s shoes.
“Ouch! My toes are tight!” Laura exclaimed.
“I should say they are!” said Pa. “Your feet have grown since last winter. How are yours, Mary?”
Mary said her toes were tight, too.
“Take off your shoes, Mary,” said Pa. “And Laura, you put them on.”
Mary’s shoes did not pinch Laura’s feet. They were good shoes, without one rip or hole in them.
“They will look almost like new when I have greased them well,” said Pa. “Mary must have new shoes. Laura can wear Mary’s, and Laura’s shoes can wait for Carrie to grow to them. It won’t take her long. Now what else is lacking, Caroline? Think what we need, and we’ll get what we can of it. Just as soon as I can hitch up we’re all going to town!”
Chapter 30