Free Thimble Summer by Elizabeth Enright

looked like a dinosaur’s neck, and clouds of golden dust filled the air. Men worked hard, pitching the bundles, packing down the straw, and hauling heavy oat sacks to the little granary by the new barn. Mr. Freebody sat high on the front of the machine, steering its long neck with a wheel, helping to build the strawstack tall, firm, and symmetrical.
    â€œWhat can I do, Daddy?” Garnet asked her father, and sneezed. The flying chaff tickled and choked her and got into her eyes. She felt itchy all over, but it was fun; everyone was working together in such speed and excitement. She wanted to have a part in it.
    â€œWell —” said her father, considering, “you might help Cicero with the oat sacks; or you can throw on bundles that have fallen on the ground. There’re lots of things you could do.”
    Cicero showed her how to wrap the burlap sacks around the pipe mouths and hold them tight with a metal clamp; and how, when one sack was full, to push a lever towards the other one, so that the oats would fall into that. You had to work fast or oats spilled on the ground and were wasted. Above the roar of the motor it was nice to hear the smooth swift rush of kernels down the pipe.
    When she had worked there for nearly an hour Garnet helped toss bundles onto the moving ramp. Jay worked beside her, pitching and perspiring and grunting with fatigue. He looked serious and important, and when she spoke to him he answered shortly.
    By and by Garnet climbed up on top of the machine to see what Mr. Freebody was doing. His eyebrows and big mustache were full of chaff, and he looked like an old walrus that had got mixed up with some seaweed.
    â€œI could eat an elephant,” he told Garnet, “a nice roasted elephant, with onions and brown gravy. In fact I think an elephant’s the only thing that would be enough of a meal to satisfy me right now.”
    Garnet laughed. “We aren’t having it though,” she said. “Our butcher doesn’t carry it. But we have got five different kinds of pie: apple, peach, blueberry, lemon, and butterscotch!”
    Mr. Freebody closed his eyes for a minute and sighed as if this was too much for him.
    â€œNext to roast elephant I like pie best of all,” he said.
    Ahead of them the glittering stack grew slowly taller till it was like a little mountain made of spun gold. Eric moved about on top of it, packing it down and making it even with a pitchfork. Every now and then he lost his balance and fell into the soft straw; Garnet and Mr. Freebody laughed loudly and rudely every time this happened.
    â€œWait here a minute,” said Mr. Freebody suddenly. “Them boys ain’t getting the loads in quick enough. I better go help ’em pitch. You take this over, Garnet. I’ll show you how to work it.” And he explained to her that the wheel on the left turned the great pipe from side to side, and the wheel on right raised it up and down.
    â€œDo you think it’ll be all right?” asked Garnet nervously.
    â€œOh it’s gentle as a baby,” said Mr. Freebody. “’T would eat right out of your hand if you’d let it. Just pat its neck once in a while and handle the wheels like I said, and it’ll go on blowing its durndest till the cows come home.”
    All the same Garnet felt extremely important as she turned the pipe slowly to what she considered a good position and pulled the rope which lifted its long mustache, and allowed the straw to blow all the way back over the stack. The golden smoke of chaff and straw thickened the air, and her arms and legs were covered with a shining dust.
    Eric climbed down from the pile to get a drink of water; the engine roared and chugged, and the sun of noonday burned in all its glory. Garnet felt drowsy; she sat up straight, opened her eyes very wide, tried humming a song, but it didn’t do any good. Pretty soon her head dropped anyway, and her thoughts began turning