Land Of The Burnt Thigh: A Lively Story of Women Homesteaders On The South Dakota Frontier

XIII

......., ...... l:III.lIt"'~ ,_ ....._-.. XIII THE THIRSTY LAND "YOU'D better do a little exhortin'," Ma told me on my return to the claim. "And if you get any collections , turn some of them in for the good of the store." "Isn't business good?" "Business is pouring in. It's money I'm talking about; there won't be any money until the crops are threshedwhich will be about Christmas time out here. Now in Blue Springs-" I didn't hear the rest of it. In the city I had been struck by the lavish spending of money, money which was at such a premium out here. There was something shockingly dis214 THE THIRSTY LAND 2 I 5 proportionate in the capacity to spend by city people and those on farms. "At least, the crops look good." "But," Ida Mary pointed out, "they need rain, and the dams are beginning to get low." "What about the wells the settlers are digging for water supply?" "They get nothing but dry holes," she told me. "Some of the settlers brought in well-drills, but they didn't find water. They don't know what to do." All other issues faded into the background before the urgency of the water problem. I packed my city clothes deep down in the trunk, never to be worn again, and went to work! A casual glance revealed no sign of the emergency we were facing. The Lower Brule was a broad expanse of green grass and grain, rippling gently in the breeze like water on a quiet sea. Sufficient moisture from the snow and early rain had been retained in the subsoil for vegetation. But we needed water. With the hot weather the dams were going dry. There had been increased demands for water this summer, and there had not been the late torrential rains to fill the dams as there had been the year before. "What are we going to do?" I asked the other settlers. "Haul water until we can get wells. We'll have to dig deeper. Perhaps we have just not struck the water veins. After this we will follow the draws." Water-hauling again! But haul it from where? There was no supply in the country sufficient for the needs of the region. Drills would cost money, and few settlers had any 216 LAND OF THE BURNT THIGH money left. There was no sign of rain, and an oppression weighed upon everyone as of impending evil-the fear of a water famine. First we had come to understand the primitive worship of fire. Now we began to know that water is as vital to life as air itself. It takes experience to bring home the meaning of familiar words. In the meantime the tall waving crops brought land agents with their buyers. At the first sign of water shortage more claims were offered for sale, and by that time there were a few deeded tracts put on the market. Loan agents camped at the settlement, following up settlers ready to prove up. One could borrow more than a thousand dollars on a homestead now. The money coming through our hands on relinquishments , options, government payments, etc., was mainly in bulk and growing beyond the coffee cans and old shoes where we secreted money awaiting deposit at the bank. We did need a bank on the Brule. During the long hot summer weeks, when it did not grow dark on the open plain until far into the night, a great deal of traveling was done at night. It was easier for man and horse. On moonlight nights that white light shining through the thin atmosphere made the prairie as light as day, but ghostly; moonlight softened the contours of the plains and robbed them of their color; sounds traveled great distances, seeming to come from space; the howling of coyotes down the draw, the shrill, busy sound of insects in the long grass, the stamping of the horses in the barn, accentuated the stillness; they did not break it. Even the THE THIRSTY LAND 2 I 7 prairie wind came softly, sweet with the scent of hay, not lifting its voice on those hushed nights. With the stillness invading one's flesh and bones, and the prairie, washed by moonlight, stretching out beyond one's imagination, I wondered that I had ever feared space and quiet. But out...