the Desert Of Wheat (2001) Read Free Page A

eyes--these were eloquent.
    "Oh, it's horrible--this need of war!" she exclaimed.
    "Yes," he replied, simply. "But maybe your brother will not be called."
    "Called! Why, he refused to wait for the draft! He went and enlisted.
    Dad patted him on the back.... If anything happens to him it'll kill my mother. Jim is her idol. It'd break my heart.... Oh, I hate the very name of Germans!"
    "My father is German," said Kurt. "He's been fifty years in America--eighteen years here on this farm. He always hated England. Now he's bitter against America.... I can see a side you can't see. But I don't blame you--for what you said."
    "Forgive me. I can't conceive of meaning that against any one who's lived here so long.... Oh, it must be hard for you."
    "I'll let my father think I'm forced to join the army. But I'm going to fight against his people. We are a house divided against itself."
    "Oh, what a pity!" The girl sighed and her eyes were dark with brooding sorrow.
    A step sounded behind them. Mr. Anderson appeared, sombrero off, mopping a very red face. His eyes gleamed, with angry glints; his mouth and chin were working. He flopped down with a great, explosive breath.
    "Kurt, your old man is a--a--son of a gun!" he exclaimed, vociferously; manifestly, liberation of speech was a relief.
    The young man nodded seriously and knowingly. "I hope, sir--he--he--"
    "He did--you just bet your life! He called me a lot in German, but I know cuss words when I hear them. I tried to reason with him--told him I wanted my money--was here to help him get that money off the farm, some way or other. An' he swore I was a capitalist--an enemy to labor an' the Northwest--that I an' my kind had caused the war."
    Kurt gazed gravely into the disturbed face of the rancher. Miss Anderson had wide-open eyes of wonder.
    "Sure I could have stood all that," went on Anderson, fuming. "But he ordered me out of the house. I got mad an' wouldn't go. Then--by George! he pulled my nose an' called me a bloody Englishman!"
    Kurt groaned in the disgrace of the moment. But, amazingly, Miss Anderson burst into a silvery peal of laughter.
    "Oh, dad!... that's--just too--good for--anything! You met your--match at last.... You know you always--boasted of your drop of English blood.... And you're sensitive--about your big nose!"
    "He must be over seventy," growled Anderson, as if seeking for some excuse to palliate his restraint. "I'm mad--but it was funny." The working of his face finally set in the huge wrinkles of a laugh.
    Young Dorn struggled to repress his own mirth, but unguardedly he happened to meet the dancing blue eyes of the girl, merry, provocative, full of youth and fun, and that was too much for him. He laughed with them.
    "The joke's on me," said Anderson. "An' I can take one.... Now, young man, I think I gathered from your amiable dad that if the crop of wheat was full I'd get my money. Otherwise I could take over the land. For my part, I'd never do that, but the others interested might do it, even for the little money involved. I tried to buy them out so I'd have the whole mortgage. They would not sell."
    "Mr. Anderson, you're a square man, and I'll do--" declared Kurt.
    "Come out an' show me the wheat," interrupted Anderson. "Lenore, do you want to go with us?"
    "I do," replied the daughter, and she took up her hat to put it on.
    Kurt led them through the yard, out past the old barn, to the edge of the open slope where the wheat stretched away, down and up, as far as the eye could see.

    Chapter II
    "We've got over sixteen hundred acres in fallow ground, a half-section in rye, another half in wheat--Turkey Red--and this section you see, six hundred and forty acres, in Bluestem," said Kurt.
    Anderson's keen eyes swept from near at hand to far away, down the gentle, billowy slope and up the far hillside. The wheat was two feet high, beginning to be thick and heavy at the heads, as if struggling to burst. A fragrant, dry, wheaty smell, mingled with dust, came on the