Almanzo went away, rubbing his ear. He went down to Trout River and swam in the swimming-hole till he felt better. But he thought it wasn’t fair that he was the youngest in the family.
That afternoon the melons were cold, and Almanzo carried them to the grass under the balsam tree in the yard. Royal stuck the butcher knife into the dewy green rinds, and every melon was so ripe that the rinds cracked open.
Almanzo and Alice and Eliza Jane and Royal bit deep into the juicy, cold slices, and they ate till they could eat no more. Almanzo pinched the sleek black seeds, popping them at Eliza Jane until she made him quit. Then he slowly ate the last slice of melon, and he said:
“I’m going to fetch Lucy to eat up the rinds.”
“You will not do any such thing!” Eliza Jane said. “The idea! A dirty old pig in the front yard!”
“She is not, either, a dirty old pig!” said Almanzo. “Lucy’s a little, young, clean pig, and pigs are the cleanest animals there are! You just ought to see the way Lucy keeps her bed clean, and turns it and airs it and makes it up every day. Horses won’t do that, nor cows, nor sheep, nor anything. Pigs—”
“I guess I know that! I guess I know as much about pigs as you do!” Eliza Jane said.
“Then don’t you call Lucy dirty! She’s just as clean as you be!”
“Well, Mother told you to obey me,” Eliza Jane answered. “And I’m not going to waste melon rinds on any pig! I’m going to make watermelon-rind preserves.”
“I guess they’re as much my rinds as they are yours,” Almanzo began, but Royal got up and said:
“Come along, ’Manzo. It’s chore-time.”
Almanzo said no more, but when the chores were done he let Lucy out of her pen. The little pig was as white as a lamb, and she liked Almanzo; her little curled tail quirked whenever she saw him. She followed him to the house, grunting happily, and she squealed for him at the door till Eliza Jane said she couldn’t hear herself think.
After supper Almanzo took a plate of scraps and fed them to Lucy. He sat on the back steps and scratched her prickly back. Pigs enjoy that. In the kitchen Eliza Jane and Royal were arguing about candy. Royal wanted some, but Eliza Jane said that candy-pulls were only for winter evenings. Royal said he didn’t see why candy wouldn’t be just as good in the summer. Almanzo thought so, too, and he went in and sided with Royal.
Alice said she knew how to make candy. Eliza Jane wouldn’t do it, but Alice mixed sugar and molasses and water, and boiled th
em; then she poured the candy on buttered platters and set it on the porch to cool. They rolled up their sleeves and buttered their hands, ready to pull it, and Eliza Jane buttered her hands, too.
All the time, Lucy was squealing for Almanzo. He went out to see if the candy was cool enough, and he thought his little pig should have some. The candy was cool. No one was watching, so he took a big wad of the soft, brown candy and dropped it over the edge of the porch into Lucy’s wide-open mouth.
Then they all pulled candy. They pulled it into long strands, and doubled the strands, and pulled again. Every time they doubled it, they took a bite.
It was very sticky. It stuck to their teeth and their fingers and their faces, somehow it got in their hair and stuck there. It should have become hard and brittle, but it didn’t. They pulled and they pulled; still it was soft and sticky. Long past bedtime, they gave it up and went to bed.
Next morning when Almanzo started to do chores, Lucy was standing in the yard. Her tail hung limp and her head hung down. She did not squeal when she saw him. She shook her head sadly and wrinkled her nose.
Where her white teeth should have been, there was a smooth, brown streak.
Lucy’s teeth were stuck together with candy! She could not eat, she could not drink, she could not even squeal. She could not grunt. But when she saw Almanzo coming, she ran.
Almanzo yelled for Royal. They chased Lucy all around the house, under the snowball bushes and the lilacs. They chased her all over the garden. Lucy whirled and dodged and ducked and ran like anything. All the time she didn’t make a sound; she couldn’t. Her mouth was full of candy.
She ran between Royal’s legs and upset him. Almanzo almost grabbed her, and went sprawling on his nose. She tore through the peas, and squashed the ripe tomatoes, and uprooted the green round cabbages. Eliza Jane kept telling Royal and Almanzo to catch her. Alice ran after her.
At last they cornered her. She dashed around Alice’s skirts. Almanzo fell on her and grabbed. She kicked, and tore a long hole down the front of his blouse.
Almanzo held her down. Alice held her kicking hind legs. Royal pried her mouth open and scraped out the candy. Then how Lucy squealed! She squealed all the squeals that had been in her all night and all the squeals she couldn’t squeal while they were chasing her, and she ran screaming to her pen.
“Almanzo James Wilder, just look at yourself!” Eliza Jane scolded. He couldn’t, and he didn’t want to.
Even Alice was horrified because he had wasted candy on a pig. And his blouse was ruined; it could be patched, but the patch would show.
“I don’t care,” Almanzo said. He was glad it was a whole week before Mother would know.
That day they made ice-cream again, and they ate the last cake. Alice said she knew how to make a pound-cake. She said she’d make one, and then she was going to go sit in the parlor.
Almanzo thought that wouldn’t be any fun. But Eliza Jane said: