A Dream to Follow Read Online Free PDF

the house.
    “Andrew asked, and I told him no.” Ingeborg laid a hand on her husband’s arm. “I’ll get a warming box ready.”
    By the time the others arrived for dinner, they had thirteen baby pigs, two in the warming box behind the stove. Andrew refused to leave his post, sitting in the corner of the box stall where they had nailed boards across the corners for the baby pigs to be able to get away when their mother lay down.
    Thorliff leaned on the stall door, watching his brother make sure that each piglet had a chance to nurse. “How many teats does she have?”
    “Eleven good ones. Pa says to knock the runt on the head, but I won’t.” Andrew held the smallest baby to a nipple. “Come on. You can suck,” Andrew urged. “I’ll keep the others away.”
    The sow grunted, lying flat on her side so her brood could nurse.
    “She been up to drink yet?”
    “Once. I put molasses in the warm water. She likes that just fine.”
    “You want me to make up some warm mash?”
    “If you want.” Andrew moved one of the more aggressive babies away from the runt.
    “You can’t stay out here all night, you know.”
    “I know, but he has to have a chance.” Andrew looked up. “You think Tante Kaaren might take him for a pet for one of the school kids?”
    Thorliff shrugged. “Maybe, if you ask her nice.”
    “If I can get him to nurse good a couple of times, he’ll have a better chance.”
    “She’d still have twelve.”
    “I know.”
    Thorliff headed for the feed bin where they kept the hog mash they’d run through the grinder. He scooped out enough for half a bucket and took it to the house for hot water and whey from the last cheese pressing.
    “How is she?” Ingeborg dipped water from the reservoir into his bucket.
    “So far all the babies are alive. That sow doesn’t dare lie on them with Andrew there.” He stirred the mash with a wooden spoon. “But you know he won’t leave her.”
    “Not even for a baseball game?” Kaaren turned from where she was slicing bread on the sideboard.
    “Not even.” Thorliff headed back out, waving at the others as he passed. Haakan had told the other children not to bother the sow right now, so they all stayed away. The women were carrying food outside to the tables, and the men stood in a circle by the coffeepot simmering over a low fire. I should have snuck upstairs and gotten my tablet. I could have stayed with Andrew in the barn . Thorliff shook his head as his stomach rumbled. Maybe he could take Andrew a plate of food and still do that. Anything for some writing time.
    “Hurry up for grace,” his mother called.
    Thorliff poured the warm mash into the trough, and the sow surged to her feet, baby pigs flying in all directions. Andrew scrambled to pull them back before she stepped on any, and he gently herded them under the cross board in one of the corners. A gunnysack hung over the board from the wall above to trap heat, and if it got too cold, they would put jars of hot water along the wall to keep the piglets warm.
    “You want I should stay?”
    Andrew shook his head. “They learn fast.”
    Thorliff joined the group of men just in time to hear his uncle Lars mention his story.
    “He really did sell it,” Haakan said, thumb and forefinger cradling the bowl of his pipe. “Going to get paid too.”
    “I always told you he was a fine writer.” Pastor Solberg added, “Don’t know what we’ll do for Christmas programs with him gone.”
    “Just because he’s graduating don’t mean he’ll be gone.” Tension sang in Haakan’s reply.
    “No, but he’ll be a man, and who knows if he’ll want to write school programs. After all . . .”
    Haakan cleared his throat. “You know how I feel about him going away to school, John. We need him here.”
    “I understand. He’ll be a big help on the threshing crew this year, but . . .”
    “No buts . He wants to keep writing—that’s fine—but he can do that in the evening like he always has. Me ’n