So Big by Edna Ferber (read books for money .txt) 📕

He inspected it again, solemnly, and added, as an afterthought, “If you ain’t feeling specially hungry. Who?⁠—” He looked about, apishly.

Selina’s cheeks matched her gown. Her eyes were wide and dark with the effort she was making to force back the hot haze threatening them. Why had she mounted this wretched soapbox! Why had she come to this hideous party! Why had she come to High Prairie! Why!⁠ ⁠…

“Miss Selina Peake, that’s who. Miss Se-li-na Peake!”

A hundred balloon faces pulled by a single cord turned toward her as she stood there on the box for all to see. They swam toward her. She put up a hand to push them back.

“What’m I bid! What’m I bid! What’m I bid for this here lovely little toothful, gents! Start her up!”

“Five cents!” piped up old Johannes Ambuul, with a snicker. The tittering crowd broke into a guffaw. Selina was conscious of a little sick feeling at the pit of her stomach. Through the haze she saw the widow’s face, no longer sulky, but smiling now. She saw Roelf’s dear dark head. His face was set, like a man’s. He was coming toward her, or trying to, but the crowd wedged him in, small as he was among those great bodies. She lost sight of him. How hot it was! how hot⁠ ⁠… An arm at her waist. Some one had mounted the little box and stood teetering there beside her, pressed against her slightly, reassuringly. Pervus DeJong. Her head was on a level with his great shoulder now. They stood together in the doorway, on the soapbox, for all High Prairie to see.

“Five cents I’m bid for this lovely little mouthful put up by the school teacher’s own fair hands. Five cents! Five⁠—”

“One dollar!” Pervus DeJong.

The balloon faces were suddenly punctured with holes. High Prairie’s jaw dropped with astonishment. Its mouth stood open.

There was nothing plain about Selina now. Her dark head was held high, and his fair one beside it made a vivid foil. The purchase of the wine-coloured cashmere was at last justified.

“And ten!” cackled old Johannes Ambuul, his rheumy eyes on Selina.

Art and human spitefulness struggled visibly for mastery in Adam Ooms’s face⁠—and art won. The auctioneer triumphed over the man. The term “crowd psychology” was unknown to him, but he was artist enough to sense that some curious magic process, working through this roomful of people, had transformed the little white box, from a thing despised and ridiculed, into an object of beauty, of value, of infinite desirability. He now eyed it in a catalepsy of admiration.

“One-ten I’m bid for this box all tied with a ribbon to match the gown of the girl who brought it. Gents, you get the ribbon, the lunch, and the girl. And only one-ten bid for all that. Gents! Gents! Remember, it ain’t only a lunch⁠—it’s a picture. It pleases the eye. Do I hear one⁠—”

“Five bits!” Barend DeRoo, of Low Prairie, in the lists. A strapping young Dutchman, the Brom Bones of the district. Aaltje Huff, in a fit of pique at his indifference, had married to spite him. Cornelia Vinke, belle of New Haarlem, was said to be languishing for love of him. He drove to the Haymarket with his load of produce and played cards all night on the wagon under the gas torches while the street girls of the neighbourhood assailed him in vain. Six feet three, his red face shone now like a harvest moon above the crowd. A merry, mischievous eye that laughed at Pervus DeJong and his dollar bid.

“Dollar and a half!” A high clear voice⁠—a boy’s voice. Roelf.

“Oh, no!” said Selina aloud. But she was unheard in the gabble. Roelf had once confided to her that he had saved three dollars and fifty cents in the last three years. Five dollars would purchase a set of tools that his mind had been fixed on for months past. Selina saw Klaas Pool’s look of astonishment changing to anger. Saw Maartje Pool’s quick hand on his arm, restraining him.

“Two dollars!” Pervus DeJong.

“Twotwotwotwotwotwo!” Adam Ooms in a frenzy of salesmanship.

“And ten.” Johannes Ambuul’s cautious bid.

“Two and a quarter.” Barend DeRoo.

“Two-fifty!” Pervus DeJong.

“Three dollars!” The high voice of the boy. It cracked a little on the last syllable, and the crowd laughed.

“Three-three-three-three-threethreethree. Three once⁠—”

“And a half.” Pervus DeJong.

“Three sixty.”

“Four!” DeRoo.

“And ten.”

The boy’s voice was heard no more.

“I wish they’d stop,” whispered Selina.

“Five!” Pervus DeJong.

“Six!” DeRoo, his face very red.

“And ten.”

“Seven!”

“It’s only jelly sandwiches,” said Selina to DeJong, in a panic.

“Eight!” Johannes Ambuul, gone mad.

“Nine!” DeRoo.

“Nine! Nine I’m bid! Nine-nine-nine! Who’ll make it⁠—”

“Let him have it. The cup cakes fell a little. Don’t⁠—”

“Ten!” said Pervus DeJong.

Barend DeRoo shrugged his great shoulders.

“Ten-ten-ten. Do I hear eleven? Do I hear ten-fifty! Ten-ten-ten tententententententen! Gents! Ten once. Ten twice! Gone!⁠—for ten dollars to Pervus DeJong. And a bargain.” Adam Ooms mopped his bald head and his cheeks and the damp spot under his chin.

Ten dollars. Adam Ooms knew, as did all the countryside, this was not the sum of ten dollars merely. No basket of food, though it contained nightingales’ tongues, the golden apple of Atalanta, wines of rare vintage, could have been adequate recompense for these ten dollars. They represented sweat and blood; toil and hardship; hours under the burning prairie sun at midday; work doggedly carried on through the drenching showers of spring; nights of restless sleep snatched an hour at a time under the sky in the Chicago market place; miles of weary travel down the rude corduroy road between High Prairie and Chicago, now up to the hubs in mud, now blinded by dust and blowing sand.

A sale at Christie’s, with a miniature going for a million, could not have met with a deeper hush, a more dramatic babble following the hush.

They ate their lunch together in one corner of Adam Ooms’s hall. Selina opened the box and took out the devilled eggs, and the cup cakes that had fallen a little, and the apples, and the sandwiches sliced very,