On the Banks of Plum Creek (Little House 4)

Carrie looked like one of the little angel-birds in the Bible. Her dress and her tiny sunbonnet were white and all trimmed with lace. Her eyes were big and solemn; her golden curls hung by her cheeks and peeped from under the bonnet behind.

Then Laura saw her own pink ribbons on Mary’s braids. She clapped her hand over her mouth before a word came out. She scrooged and looked down her own back. Mary’s blue ribbons were on her braids!

She and Mary looked at each other and did not say a word. Ma, in her hurry, had made a mistake. They hoped she would not notice. Laura was so tired of pink and Mary was so tired of blue. But Mary had to wear blue because her hair was golden and Laura had to wear pink because her hair was brown.

Pa came driving the wagon from the stable. He had brushed Sam and David till they shone in the morning sunshine. They stepped proudly, tossing their heads, and their manes and tails rippled.

There was a clean blanket on the wagon seat and another spread on the bottom of the wagon box. Pa carefully helped Ma climb up over the wheel. He lifted Carrie to Ma’s lap. Then he tossed Laura into the wagon box, and her braids flew out.

“Oh dear!” Ma exclaimed. “I put the wrong ribbons on Laura’s hair!”

“It’ll never be noticed on a trotting horse!” said Pa. So Laura knew she could wear the blue ribbons.

Sitting beside Mary on the clean blanket in the wagon bottom, she pulled her braids over her shoulder. So did Mary, and they smiled at each other. Laura could see the blue whenever she looked down, and Mary could see the pink.

Pa was whistling, and when Sam and David started he began to sing.

“Oh, every Sunday morning

My wife is by my side

A-waiting for the wagon,

And we’ll all take a ride!”

“Charles,” Ma said, softly, to remind him that this was Sunday. Then they all sang together,

“There is a happy land,

Far, far away,

Where saints in glory stand,

Bright, bright as day!”

Plum Creek came out from the willow shadows and spread wide and flat and twinkling in the sunshine. Sam and David trotted through the sparkling shallows. Glittering drops flew up, and waves splashed from the wheels. Then they were away on the endless prairie.

The wagon rolled softly along the road that hardly made a mark on the green grasses. Birds sang their morning songs. Bees hummed. Great yellow bumblebees went bumbling from flower to flower, and big grasshoppers flew whirring up and away.

Too soon they came to town. The blacksmith shop was shut and still. The doors of the stores were closed. A few dressed-up men and women, with their dressed-up children, walked along the edges of dusty Main Street. They were all going toward the church.

The church was a new building not far from the schoolhouse. Pa drove toward it through the prairie grass. It was like the schoolhouse, except that on its roof was a tiny room with no walls and nothing in it.

“What’s that?” Laura asked.

“Don’t point, Laura,” said Ma. “It’s a belfry.”

Pa stopped the wagon against the high porch of the church. He helped Ma out of the wagon, but Laura and Mary just stepped over the side of the wagon box. They all waited there while Pa drove into the shade of the church, unhitched Sam and David and tied them to the wagon box.

People were coming through the grass, climbing the steps and going into the church. There was a solemn, low rustling inside it.

At last Pa came. He took Carrie on his arm and walked with Ma into the church. Laura and Mary walked softly, close behind them. They all sat in a row on a long bench.

Church was exactly like a schoolhouse, except that it had a strange, large, hollow feeling. Every little noise was loud against the new board walls.

A tall, thin man stood up behind the tall desk on the platform. His clothes were black and his big cravat was black and his hair and the beard that went around his face were dark. His voice was gentle and kind. All the heads bowed down. The man’s voice talked to God for a long time, while Laura sat perfectly still and looked at the blue ribbons on her braids. Suddenly, right beside her, a voice said, “Come with me.”

Laura almost jumped out of her skin. A pretty lady stood there, smiling out of soft blue eyes. The lady said again, “Come with me, little girls. We are going to have a Sunday-school class.”