Laura ran to the darkened window, but she could not see Ma. She could see nothing but the whirling whiteness swishing against the glass. The wind screamed and howled and gibbered. There seemed to be voices in it. Ma would go step by step, holding tight to the clothes-line. She would come to the post and go on, blind in the hard snow whirling and scratching her cheeks. Laura tried to think slowly, one step at a time, till now, surely, Ma bumped against the stable door.
Ma opened the door and blew in with the snow. She turned and pushed the door shut quickly, and dropped the latch into its notch. The stable would be warm from the heat of the animals, and steamy with their breath. It was quiet there; the storm was outside, and the sod walls were thick. Now Sam and David turned their heads and whickered to Ma. The cow coaxed, “Moo-oo,” and the big calf cried, “Baw!” The pullets were scratching here and there, and one of the hens was saying to herself, “Crai-ai-kree-eek.”
Ma would clean all the stalls with the pitchfork. Forkful by forkful she threw the old bedding on the manure-pile. Then she took the hay they had left in their mangers, and spread it to make them clean beds.
From the hay-pile she pitched fresh hay into manger after manger, till all four mangers were full. Sam and David and Spot and her calf munched the rustling good hay. They were not very thirsty, because Pa had watered them all before he went to town.
With the old knife that Pa kept by the turnip-pile Ma cut up turnips. She put some in each feed-box, and now the horses and cattle crunched the crisp turnips. Ma looked at the hens’ water-dish to make sure they had water. She scattered a little corn for them, and gave them a turnip to peck.
Now she must be milking Spot.
Laura waited until she was sure that Ma was hanging up the milking-stool. Carefully fastening the stable door behind her, Ma came back toward the house, holding tight to the rope.
But she did not come. Laura waited a long time. She made up her mind to wait longer, and she did. The wind was shaking the house now. Snow as fine and grainy as sugar covered the window sill and sifted off to the floor and did not melt.
Laura shivered in her shawl. She kept on staring at the blank window-panes, hearing the swishing snow and the howling, jeering winds. She was thinking of the children whose Pa and Ma never came. They burned all the furniture and froze stark stiff.
Then Laura could be still no longer. The fire was burning well, but only that end of the room was really warm. Laura pulled the rocking-chair near the open oven and set Carrie in it and straightened her dress. Carrie rocked the chair gaily, while Laura and Mary went on waiting.
At last the back door burst open. Laura flew to Ma. Mary took the milk-pail while Laura untied Ma’s hood. Ma was too cold and breathless to speak. They helped her out of the jumper.
The first thing she said was, “Is there any milk left?”
There was a little milk in the bottom of the pail, and some was frozen to the pail’s inside. “The wind is terrible,” Ma said. She warmed her hands, and then she lighted the lamp and set it on the window sill.
“Why are you doing that, Ma?” Mary asked her, and Ma said, “Don’t you think the lamplight’s pretty, shining against the snow outside?”
When she was rested, they ate their supper of bread and milk. Then they all sat still by the stove and listened. They heard the voices howling and shrieking in the wind, and the house creaking, and the snow swishing.
“This will never do!” said Ma. “Let’s play bean-porridge hot! Mary, you and Laura play it together, and, Carrie, you hold up your hands. We’ll do it faster than Mary and Laura can!
So they all played bean-porridge hot, faster and faster until they could not say the rhymes, for laughing. Then Mary and Laura washed the supper cups, while Ma settled down to her knitting.
Carrie wanted more bean-porridge hot, so Mary and Laura took turns playing it with her. Every time they stopped she shouted, “More! More!”
The voices in the storm howled and giggled and shrieked, and the house trembled. Laura was patting on Carrie’s hands,
“Some like it hot, some like it cold,
Some like it in the pot, nine days—”
The stovepipe sharply rattled. Laura looked up and screamed, “Ma! The house is on fire!”
A ball of fire was rolling down the stovepipe. It was bigger than Ma’s big ball of yarn. It rolled across the stove and dropped to the floor as Ma sprang up. She snatched up her skirts and stamped on it. But it seemed to jump through her foot, and it rolled to the knitting she had dropped.
Ma tried to brush it into the ashpan. It ran in front of her knitting needles, but it followed the needles back. Another ball of fire had rolled down the stovepipe, and another. They rolled across the floor after the knitting needles and did not burn the floor.
“My goodness!” Ma said.
While they watched those balls of fire rolling, suddenly there were only two. Then there were none. No one had seen where they went.
“That is the strangest thing I ever saw,” said Ma. She was afraid.
All the hair on Jack’s back was standing up. He walked to the door, lifted up his nose, and howled.
Mary cowered in her chair and Ma put her hands over her ears. “For pity’s sake, Jack, hush,” she begged him.
Laura ran to Jack, but he did not want to be hugged. He went back to his corner and lay with his nose on his paws, his hair bristling and his eyes shining in the shadow.