Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance | Page 8

wore a neat, pretty dress that had belonged to Betsy. She had on Sarah's shawl. Her hair was combed in two neat pigtails. Her face had a clean, scrubbed look. Her eyes were sparkling. She was taking Betsy and Mathilda to call on one of the neighbors.
"Good-by, Mamma," she called.
Sarah stood in the doorway, waving to the girls. Then she saw Abe, his arms piled high with wood. "Come in," she said. "Sally has had her bath. Now I've got a tub of good hot water and a gourd full of soap waiting for you. Skedaddle out of those old clothes and throw them in the fire."
"I ain't got any others." Abe looked terrified.
"I don't aim to pluck your feathers without giving you some new ones." Sarah laughed. "I sat up late last night, cutting down a pair of Mr. Johnston's old pants. I got a shirt, too, laid out here on the bed."
Slowly Abe started taking off his shirt. He looked fearfully at the tub of hot water.
"There's no call to be scared," said Sarah. "That tub won't bite. Now I'm going down to the spring. By the time I get back, I want you to have yourself scrubbed all over."
Abe stuck one toe into the water. He said, "Ouch!" and drew it out. He then tried again, and put in his whole foot. He put in his other foot. He sat down in the tub. By the time Sarah returned he was standing before the fire, dressed in the cut-down trousers and shirt of the late Mr. Johnston.
Sarah seemed pleased. "You look like a different boy," she said. "Those trousers are a mite too big, but you'll soon grow into them."
Abe was surprised how good it felt to be clean again. "Thank you, ma'am. Now I'd better get in some more wood."
"We have plenty of wood," said Sarah. "You see that stool? You sit down and let me get at your hair. It looks like a heap of underbrush."
Abe watched anxiously when she opened the top drawer of the bureau and took out a haw comb and a pair of scissors. I'll stand for it this time, he thought, because she's been so good to us. But if she pulls too hard--
Mrs. Lincoln did pull. But when Abe said "Ouch!" she patted his shoulder and waited a moment. He closed his eyes and screwed up his face, but he said nothing more. Perhaps she couldn't help pulling, he decided. Lock after lock she snipped off. He began to wonder if he was going to have any hair left by the time she got through.
"I've been watching you, Abe. You're a right smart boy," she said. "Had much schooling?"
"I've just been to school by littles."
"Have you a mind to go again?"
"There ain't any school since Master Crawford left. Anyhow, Pappy doesn't set much store by eddication."
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"What do you mean, Abe?"
"He says I know how to read and write and cipher and that's enough for anyone."
"You can read?" she asked.
"Yes'm, but I haven't any books."
"You can read and you haven't any books. I have books and I can't read."
Abe looked at her, amazed. "You have _books_?"
Sarah nodded, but said nothing more until she had finished cutting his hair. Then she led him over to the bureau.
"Now see if you don't like yourself better without that brush heap on top of your head," she asked him.
A boy with short neat hair gazed back at Abe from the mirror.
"I still ain't the prettiest boy in Pigeon Creek," he drawled, "but there ain't quite so much left to be ugly. I'm right glad, ma'am, you cleared away the brush heap."
Was he joking? He looked so solemn that Sarah could not be sure. Then he grinned. It was the first time that she had seen him smile.
"You're a caution, Abe," she said. "Now sit yourself down over there at the table, and I'll show you my books."
She opened the top drawer of the bureau and took out four worn little volumes. Although she could not read, she knew the titles: "Here they are: Robinson Crusoe, _Pilgrim's Progress_, Sinbad the Sailor, and _Aesop's Fables_."
"Oh, ma'am, this book by Mr. Aesop is one the schoolmaster had. The stories are all about some smart talking animals."
He seemed to have forgotten her, as he bent his neat shorn head down over the pages. He chuckled when he read something that amused him. Sarah watched him curiously. He was not like her John. He was not like any boy that she had ever known. But the hungry look in his eyes went straight to her heart.
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He looked up at her shyly. "Ma'am," he said, "will you let me read these books sometimes?"
"Why, Abe, you can read them any time you like. I'm giving them to you to keep."
"Oh, Mamma!"