Spring also meant we could finally remove the heavy winter underwear that covered us neck to ankles in scratchy gray wool. I felt almost bare naked and so free. We finally moved into the wooden boarding house. Though it was little and crude by Buttonfields standards, the feel of a real house above my head and under my feet just about made up for the added chore of scrubbing the floor with clean river sand and the hog-bristle brush. There was room for twice as many beds, which meant twice as many biscuits, twice as many beans, and twice as many sheets to boil in great kettles outside, pound with battling sticks, and spread on bushes to dry. As if all this weren't enough, Mama decided that Butte was getting too rough and wild and uneducated and that I should teach him after supper each day and some on Sunday afternoon. "What do you mean, uneducated?" said Butte when I told him. "I already know forty-eight words for liquor." "You lie. You don't," I said. "Do." "Don't." Butte stood up and cleared his throat like someone about to make a speech.
What do You think about The Ballad Of Lucy Whipple?
