Joe wrinkled his brow. He'd had his setbacks, but none comparable to the recent disasters. A whole crop ruined and a valuable cow lost. It seemed that the land over which he had labored so hard had rejected him completely. He knew a sudden wild urge to be away, to start immediately for Oregon where a man was his own master. Joe led the mule around a corner of the house and saw Tad leaning against the building. Joe stopped and said gruffly, "Sorry I yelled, Tad." Tad shrugged. "Clover's leg was broke. I saw it myself. What could you do except shoot her?" "Nothing," Joe admitted, "but womenfolk don't--" "Don't what?" Tad asked. "They don't understand some things." It was a lame explanation and one which, Joe felt, did not suffice. Women understood most things, and Joe knew of men who had died in agony while other men stood uncaringly near. That being the way things were sometimes, there was something mighty wholesome about anyone at all who could shed genuine tears over a dead cow. But Joe could think of nothing else to say. Tad asked too casually, "What'd you find out this morning, Pa?" Without answering immediately, Joe put the mule in the pasture, slipped her bridle off, and closed the gate. As far as he knew, none of the children even suspected that he and Emma were planning to go west. But Tad had a way of finding out much that he was not supposed to know; perhaps he had been lying awake, listening, the night Joe returned from Tenney's and talked with Emma. He turned to Tad and said, "You come along and see." The youngest children met him at the door, and Joe's heart lightened. The mysterious fevers attacked baby Emma without any warning at all. But they left her just as quickly and obviously she was well again. Joe knew that the youngsters wanted to play with him, but he felt that it was not a moment for play. They were on the verge of a profound uprooting that would affect the lives of all. Barbara sat gracefully on a chair. Emma leaned against the sink, and Tad slipped unobtrusively past to make himself small in one corner. Joe glanced at the youngster and saw his eyes glowing and his face wild with excitement. He cleared his throat and wished desperately that he was a master of story-telling so that he might give his expectant family an exact word picture. "I saw Grandpa Seeley at Hammerstown," he began. "He's an old man who's spent most of his life in the west and...."