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154 LISTEN HERE CALL HOME THE HEART (1932) from Chapter 3 When that first year's crop was harvested it proved as abundant as its promise. Britt walked among his neighbors feeling their commending eyes upon him. Gaffney [the storekeeper] shook his hand when he brought his first load ofcorn down to pay on the family debt. That debt was larger than Britt expected to find it. There were twelve in the household, not counting the company that Jim's affliction brought in, and four of the children were going to school. However inexorably they limited their spending, some needs had to be met. And Gaffney, always liberal ofheart, had met them. Britt and Ishma decided to pay him in full, and do without any new winter clothes. They had to buy a cow, but cows were cheap that year, and Abe Marsh let them have one with a heifer calf for thirty bushels of corn. That was as far as the crop would stretch, aside from the part they must keep for bread and feed. But Jim was getting well, and wouldn't need any more money for medicine and liniment and invalid's kickshaws. The doctor had told them two months before that he wouldn't have to come again, and that immense drain was stopped. Britt sold his gun and laid the money away for the time when Ishma would need it. They felt even with the world, and were not afraid to start a new debt at Gaffney's. This was necessary because Britt intended to put in most of the winter clearing new-ground. They knew that the old fields would not repeat their generosity another year. It wasn't possible to put all of the "stalk land" in orchard grass and sweet clover as they had planned, for seed was too costly. Orchard grass would make good summer pasture, and when it died down there would be the green winter clover for the cattle. They expected to have their own ox-team to feed the next year, and not be dependent on neighbors for plough-brutes. But it would take fifty dollars to seed the land. That would have to wait. It was February and bitter cold when Edward Britton Hensley was born. Ishma knew she would never forget how cold it was, and how cramped they were for room. She had wanted Laviny to give up her bed in the middle room and let her be sick there, but her mother said there was no use beginning to humor her, she'd have to get used to things like any married woman. So Ishma kept her own bed in the corner of the big room where Jim and Bainie, with their two least ones, occupied another corner, and Sam, Andy and Ben, another. Nettie and Ellie slept with Laviny in the middle room. When Ishma's hour approached, the children all were sent OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN 155 off to the neighbors for a day and night. But they trooped back too soon for Ishma's peace. "Can't you send them out a little while?" she asked Bainie, feebly hopeful. "They've jest been out. I kain't send'em right back an' the air hangin' with ice. They're all keepin' back there in the kitchen. I reckon you don't want the whole house." "Sounds like they're right on the other side 0' the wall, banging and yelping." "You'll have to git aholt 0' yersef, Ishmalee," said her mother, "an' not let Britt make a fool 0' ye." Britt went up to the barn where he could swear unimpeded. He wouldn't let Ishma sit up for two weeks, although Laviny insisted on her "comin' out ofit" the ninth day. He and Laviny had their first quarrel, but Britt suddenly became very quiet when he saw tears pushing from under Ishma's eyelashes. He went to her and whispered, "Next time we'll be to ourselves," and with a vehemence that bewildered him she had answered, "There'll be no next time!" Ned was the finest baby that had ever come into the family. Laviny admitted it, and when he was old enough to return her attachment, she pushed Ishma aside and took possession of him. "You'll have plenty more," she said. ''I'll look out fer this'n." Within a month after his birth, Ishma had regained her bloom and her strength, though she was a little...

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