California, Southern -- Fiction; Motion picture industry -- Fiction; Petroleum industry and trade -- Fiction; Political fiction
Well, old Mr. Watkins invited them cordially to come in; and Sadie and
Meelie gave up their chairs and sat on a box or something in a corner of
the room. It was the first time that Bunny had been inside the Watkins’
home, and it gave him a shuddering sense of poverty. It was bare boards
inside, the same as out; there was a big, unpainted table, and six
unpainted chairs, a few shelves with crockery, a few pans hanging on the
wall, and a stove that rested on a stone where one leg was broken. That
was everything, literally everything—save for a feeble kerosene lamp,
which enabled you to see the rest. There were two other rooms to the
cabin, one for the husband and wife, and the other for the three girls,
who slept in one bed. Attached to the back of the house was a shed with
two bunks against the wall, the top one occupied by Eli, and the other
vacant, a reminder of the sheep that had strayed.
Eli was in the room, having come back from his expedition. Eli was now
eighteen, and had attained the full stature of a man; also his voice was
that of a man, except that now and then it cracked and went up in a way
that would have been comical, if anybody that listened to Eli ever had a
sense of fun. Just now he was telling his parents and wondering sisters
how the Holy Spirit had blessed him again, the shivers had seized him,
and old Mrs. Puffer had been instantly relieved of her pains. Mr.
Watkins said “Amen!” three or four times, very loud, and then he turned
to Dad, remarking, “The Lord blesses us in our children.” Dad said yes,
that was true, possibly more true than they knew; he asked, had Mr.
Watkins ever thought of the possibility that the Lord might send a new
revelation into the world? And instantly you could see the family sit
up, and fix their eyes upon Dad, the whole six of them, as rigid as so
many statues. What did their visitor mean?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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