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"I’ll tell the world you have grit. So has the water. It is so hard you could cut it with an ax."

It's not getting any easier for Elsie ("Emma Louise"). Or is it?

Wash Days

“The cistern water is gone,” mused Emma Louise, “and there is not enough town water in the barrel for washing. It would take a whole extra barrelfull anyway, for the wash, and Jimmy does not have time this morning to go to town. This is such a nice day I really ought to wash.”

So out to the well went Emma Louise to pump some water. It looked as if the water really ought to wash clothes, even if it would not cook beans, they just got harder and harder.

Pailfull after pailfull of the dreadful smelling stuff she carried up the hill and poured into the boiler standing on the kitchen range. She had to hold her nose, it smelled just like Epsom salts, in large quantities. By the time the boiler was filled and the water had begun to heat, the room was filled with a very unpleasant odor.

“I certainly do not like to put the clothes into that water,” Emma Louise said to the big gray cat snugly curled on the cushion of the rocking chair. “What will they smell like afterwards?”

In spite of the generous amount of washing powders and soap used, the water seemed greasy, thick, sort of sticky. It would not make a suds. In spite of Emma Louise’s rubbing and rubbing, the clothes would not come clean. Instead of being dirty in spots, they were now gray all over.

“Such water, such a wash,” sighed Emma Louise.

And then she laughed; “Well, they will have to be dried before they can be washed again.” So she hung them on the line. The line not being entirely adequate, she hung some on the fence; a very high and tightly stretched woven wire fence, running east and west.

When the wind from the south blew a little harder, the garments, flattened against the wire mesh, were firmly held in place.

But alas, Emma Louise’s troubles for that day were not over. The wind blew harder still, picking up loose soil in a freshly turned field to the south. Black, rich soil is all right were it belongs, on the bosom of old Mother Earth, we are glad to have it. But fine, black soil blowing through the air is another matter; and when it comes in contact with wet clothes hanging on a fence, a reckoning is due.

When Jimmy came in to dinner, Emma Louise showed signs of weeping. In fact, there had been almost a cloudburst, but the worst of the storm was over.

“Have trouble with the wash this morning?” Jimmy inquired, man-fashion.

“Did I?” snapped Emma Louise, like a turtle.

“Phew, this must be worse than I thought,” Jimmy said to himself. “Something is really wrong to make her bite like that.”

“I never would have tried to wash in that well water if I had known it was as hard as a brick,” Emma Louise said, a trifle more gently.

“Did you try to wash in that well water? I’ll tell the world you have grit. So has the water. It is so hard you could cut it with an ax.” Jimmy was all sympathy. “It seems to me I remember Mother used lye in hard water.”

Sparks began to fly from Emma Louise’s eyes.

Jimmy hastened to add, “But I do not believe a whole can of lye would soften that water.”

“We can try it,” Emma Louise agreed. “I can go to town this afternoon and get some lye. If that does not work, you will have to fetch an extra barrel of water each washday until it rains.”

So, after the dinner dishes were done, Jimmy hitched blind Nelly to the buggy and Emma Louise drove to town.

The bright summer afternoon, the meadow larks singing from fence-post and field, soothed the girl’s troubled spirit as the old mare jogged along. Emma Louise was not even vexed when Nelly tried to turn in the middle of the narrow bridge over Ponca Creek. She sprang lightly over the wheel, and, grasping the bridle ring, led the old mare safely across.

Laughing she rubbed the mare’s nose and spoke softly to her: “Will you always turn around on this bridge, Nelly dear? We must go to town before we can go back home.”

The next morning, Emma Louise again filled her boiler with the well water which smelled like Epsom salts, then opened her can of lye.

“Let me see,” carefully reading the directions on the can. “That ought to be enough.” She dropped the lye into the water and began to stir.

White curds began to form, and they kept on forming, thicker and faster. The water seemed to be full of them. Emma dipped them out, and she kept on dipping them out, until a large part of the water had also been dipped out.

“The water that is left must surely be softened,” she thought. But no, it still felt ‘hard’ to her hand. So in went some more lye. More curds were dipped out, and still more, until only a little water was left in the bottom of the boiler.

“Well, that’s that. This water certainly is ‘permanently hard’ as we said in Chemistry.” No clothes were washed that morning.

When Jimmy came in at noon, Emma Louise made the statement that never again would she try to wash clothes in the well water, lye or no lye.

“Just see here,” she said, trailing her hand through the remaining water still thick with curds, which she had left standing on the back of the stove. “By the time these are dipped out the boiler will be empty and I started with it full.”

Wise woman to save the evidence for her husband to see.

“Well, honey, right after dinner, I shall take the wagon and fetch you a barrel of water so you can try again tomorrow,” Jimmy soothed.

As Emma Louise set dinner on the table, she noticed Jimmy very busy at his desk.

“What are you writing, Jimmy?” she wanted to know.

“Just a letter to mail in town.”

“What kind of a letter, Jimmy?”

“Oh, just an order for something we need.”

“But what do we need now, Jimmy?”

“Why, a washing machine, Emma Louise, so you will not have so much trouble on wash days after this. I was trying to keep it a secret but it seems that can not be done.”

“Oh, Jimmy, you darling.” Two strong young arms were thrown about his neck, and the dignified man of the house received a resounding kiss on each of his sun-tanned cheeks.

“I shall not have to wash next week until it comes,” Emma Louise joyfully cried. “If it would only rain before then so there would be nice, soft water.”

And it did.

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