Twenty Miles From A Match: Homesteading In Western Nevada

Chapter Fourteen

.~( Fourteen l~ Edson was very fastidious about caring for his furs. One morning he carne in from his trapline with two coyotes. He skinned them, but he didn't have enough time to flush and stretch them before school. Daddy said, "Leave them, and I'll take care of them for you." Edson didn't think Daddy was careful enough with the furs, but just then the school bell rang, so he turned them over to Daddy with a last precaution, "Be careful!" In stretching the skins, Daddy pulled off one of the tails, and not knowing what else to do with it, he threw it away. When Edson carne out of school at recess, he ran around to look at his hides. He carne in the house fairly storming at his father, "You've ruined one of the hides. The tail's gone!" Then I, the peacemaker, carne to the rescue. "Where is the tail," I asked. "I'll sew it on, and hide the stitches so they'll never show." Edson brought me the tail and went back to school pacified knowing Ma could fix it. I sewed the tail on as best I could, but it didn't look right. Something was surely wrong. I knew I had hidden my stitches carefully I thought, "Well, I've done the best I can. I'll just forget it." When Edson carne out of school at noon he went CHAPTER FOURTEEN 125 around to inspect my handiwork. He came in with a broad grin on his face and said, "You did a pretty good job, Ma. Your stitches don't show./I Then laughing outright he said, "You sewed the tail on the belly instead of on the back./I Well, no wonder it didn't look right. I then went out and sewed the tail where it belonged, and peace was restored. After we had acquired the desert claim everything looked brighter for us. We were slowly but surely gaining. Our herd of cattle and horses was increasing , and we had a Model-T Ford. I went into chicken ranching in a modest way, and also raised turkeys and geese for the market. One spring a turkey and a goose both laid eggs in the same nest in an A shaped coop. The goose went to setting first and didn't leave the nest for days. I wanted to rescue the turkey eggs so they wouldn't spoil, but as a setting goose is a rather ferocious bird to disturb I bided my time till the goose would leave the nest to feed. All the while a goose sets on the nest, the gander stands guard, making a formidable pair to disturb. Finally I saw the goose come off to feed, the gander still standing guard at the front of the coop. I called to Daddy to come with me and stand at the front of the coop to attract the gander'S attention, while I got down on my hands and knees at the back of the coop to reach under and rescue the turkey eggs. But the old goose saw us and promptly came running back and got on her nest. As I reached in to get the eggs, she bit my hand unmercifully, then the gander came around to the back of the coop and bit and flogged me from behind. I took an awful punishment for a few minutes, but succeeded in getting the turkey eggs. I looked up and there stood Daddy at the front of 126 TWENTY MILES FROM A MATCH the coop laughing. "Well, old lady," he exclaimed, "I wasn't a hell of an attraction, was I?" That spring, after a heavy winter, Warm Springs Creek, which was usually a dry wash on the desert, became a raging torrent. Some bartenders from Reno, while driving through the desert, saw this big stream of water and thinking the stream was always that heavy, they went in together and homesteaded one hundred and sixty acres of land apiece. They built a big reservoir, dug a ditch from the creek to the reservoir (both were in sandy soil), and then they broke out and planted ten acres in alfalfa and wheat. They built a five-foot chicken-wire fence around their crop to keep out the jack rabbits, and they built a oneroom cabin. Then they sent out an old opiate...