have not something big to think of while you are waiting, the loneliness might eat into your very soul.”
“And after the settlers come the road will follow?” said Hugh.
“I have thought many times of how it will be,” answered Oscar, leaning forward to point. “The road will come winding down that hillside, white and smooth and dusty with much travel. There by that group of pines will be Linda’s house, with a space for children to play in the meadow below. Nels Larson’s place will be there just north of it by that knoll, and Ole Peterson’s across the stream. And by the bend of the river there will be a little town with a school and white houses with gardens and a church with a square spire, just as it used to be in Sweden. I have pictured it a hundred times as I sit here by the door. I know every house and field and meadow, just how it will all be. Sometimes I think I can almost hear the church bells ring already or the children calling to each other as they go across the fields to school.”
