Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance | Page 9

The name slipped out as though he were used to saying it. He had a feeling that Nancy, his own mother, had never gone away.
"You're my boy, now," Sarah told him, "and I aim to help you all I can. The next time a school keeps in these parts, I'm going to ask your pappy to let you and the other children go."
"Thank you, ma'am," said Abe. "I mean--thank you, Mamma."

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Many changes were taking place in the Lincoln cabin. Sarah persuaded Tom to cut two holes in the walls for windows, and she covered them with greased paper to let in the light. He made a wooden door that could be shut against the cold winter winds. Abe and Dennis gave the walls and low ceiling a coat of whitewash, and Sarah spread her bright rag rugs on the new wooden floor.
"Aunt Sairy," Dennis told her, "you're some punkins. One just naturally has to be somebody when you're around."
Abe smiled up at her shyly. "It is sort of like the magic in that story of Sinbad you gave me."
The other children were asleep. Abe sprawled on the floor, making marks on a wooden shovel with a pointed stick. Tom, seated in one of his wife's chairs, was dozing on one side of the fireplace.
Sarah put down her knitting and looked around the cabin. "The place does look right cozy," she replied. "What is that you're doing, Abe?"
"Working my sums."
Tom opened his eyes. "You know how to figure enough already. Put that shovel up and go to bed."
Abe took a knife and scraped the figures from the wooden shovel. He placed it against one side of the fireplace. "Good night, Mamma," he said.
"Good night, Abe."
Sarah's eyes were troubled. She waited until Dennis had joined Abe in the loft, then turned to her husband. "I've been meaning to tell you, Tom, what a good pa you've been to my young ones."
She saw that he was pleased. "I've tried to be a good mother to Abe and Sally, too," she went on.
"You have been, Sairy. They took to you right off."
"I'm right glad, but there's something else I want to talk to you about, Tom." He was nodding again in his chair, and she paused to make sure that he was listening. "Abe's a smart boy. I told him the next time a school keeps in these parts, I'd ask you to let him and the other children go."
"Humph!" Tom grunted. "There ain't any school for him to go to. Anyway, he wastes enough time as 'tis. He's always got his nose buried in those books you brought."
"That bothers me, too. I saw you cuff him the other day because he was reading."
"I had to, Sairy. I told him to come out and chop some wood, but he up and laughed in my face."
"He wasn't laughing at you, Tom. He was laughing at Sinbad."
"Who in tarnation is Sinbad?"
"A fellow in one of his books. Abe said that Sinbad sailed his flatboat up to a rock, and the rock was magnetized and pulled all the nails out of his boat. Then Sinbad fell into the water."
"That's what I mean," Tom exploded. "Dennis told him that book was most likely lies, but Abe keeps on reading it. Where is all this book learning going to get him? More'n I ever had."
"Maybe the Lord meant for young ones to be smarter than their parents," said Sarah, "or the world might never get any better."
Tom shook his head in dismay. "Women and their fool notions! If I don't watch out, you'll be spoiling the boy more'n his own mammy did."
Sarah's cheeks were red as she bent over her knitting. Tom was right about one thing. There was no school for Abe to go to. But some day there would be. Every few weeks another clearing was made in the forest, and the neighbors gathered for a "house raising" to help put up a cabin. Then smoke would rise from a new chimney, and another new home would be started in the wilderness.
With so many new settlers, there was usually plenty of work for Abe. Whenever Tom did not need him at home, he hired out at twenty-five cents a day. He gave this money to his father. That was the law, Tom said. Not until Abe was twenty-one would he be allowed to keep his wages for himself. As a hired boy, he plowed corn, chopped wood, and did all kinds of chores. He did not like farming, but he managed to have fun.
"Pa taught me to work," Abe told one farmer who had hired him, "but he never taught me to love it."
The farmer scratched his head. He couldn't understand a boy who was always reading, and if Abe wasn't reading he was telling jokes. The