A Winter's Promise by Jeanette Gilge Page B

pictures. “ Mine! Mine! ” she insisted.
    “ Oh, for goodness ’ sake, ” Emma said. “ She wants her picture. ”
    When Emma gave it to her, Ellie handed it to Al with a big grin.
    “ That ’ s a telephone, ” he told her.
    Fred looked puzzled. “ What ’ s a tele . . . tele — ”
    “ Telephone, ” Albert informed him, as though he knew a ll about it.
    “ Tell Fred what it is, ” Al challenged.
    “ Well ... it ’ s a ... Mama told me. . . . ” He shrugged. “ I forgot. ”
    Al smiled. “ A telephone, ” he explained between mouthfuls of oatmeal, “ is, well, it ’ s a ... guess you ’ d call it an instrument that you use to talk to people who are far away. See, ” he pointed and the boys craned their necks to look, “ this is the receiver where you listen, and this is the mouthpiece. That ’ s what you talk into. ”
    “ Did you ever see one? ” Emma asked quietly.
    “ Sure did! Watched a man talkin ’ on one in town last year. He let me listen. ”
    ‘“ Did it, sound like a real person? ” Albert asked.
    “ Yup! Sounded far away, though, and there was some crackling sound, but I could hear every word. ”
    “ How far away was he? ” Albert said, spoon in the air.
    “ Clear across town. ”
    Emma shook her head. “ That ’ s hard to believe. ”
    Albert wrinkled his forehead. “ How does the sound get through? ”
    “ I don ’ t know exactly, but it has something to do with electricity. ”
    “ Lectricity? What ’ s that? ”
    Al rolled his eyes and rubbed his chin. “ Now, how do I explain that? ” he asked Emma. “ Well, you can ’ t see it, but it ’ s a power and it can go through wires. Somehow that power is changed back to the sound of the voice again, when it gets to the telephone receiver. ”
    “ Where are the wires? ” Albert wanted to know.
    “ They ’ re strung way up high on tall poles all along the streets or roads. ” Al spread a thick slice of bread with butter. “ We ’ ll have a telephone someday. ”
    Albert ’ s eyes widened. “ We will? ”
    “ Sure will, ” Al continued. “ The telephone was in vented way back in 1876, and here it is 1892. It ’ s high time we got ‘ em out here where we need ‘ em. ”
    Emma stared out the window. “ Wouldn ’ t that be something. . .
    Al chuckled. “ One thing, we won ’ t have any trouble getting poles for the wires around these parts! ”
    “ Would I be able to talk to my ma? That ’ s over three miles. ”
    “ Sure you could. You could talk to Kate, too. That ’ s called ‘ long distance. ’”
    Emma ’ s eyes brightened. “ But what ’ ll it cost to buy one? ”
    “ As I understand it, you don ’ t buy it. You pay rent on it. The telephone company owns it. ”
    “ How soon do you think...
    Al shrugged. “ Oh, I don ’ t know five, ten years, maybe. ”
    Emma blinked back tears. Al would be home instead of in camp by then. Now was when she needed it.
    Al didn ’ t notice her misty eyes and went on telling the boys there would be all kinds of inventions by the time they grew up.
    “ What ’ s an invention? ” Albert wanted to know.
    “ Well, now, an invention is something someone makes that hasn ’ t been made before. Sleighs had to be invented, and wagons — even stoves. You ’ ll learn a lot about inventions when you go to school. ”
    Albert took a hasty drink of milk, leaving a white mustache above his mouth. “ When kin I go to school? ”
    “ Maybe this fall. ”
    “ Will Miss Clark be there? ”
    “ I s ’ pose so. ”
    “ She ’ s purdy. ”
    Al and Emma chuckled. “ He ’ s a Verleger all right, ” Al said to Emma. “ Knows a pretty girl when he sees one. ”
    Emma ignored the comment. “ Jenny Clark looks a lot like Kate ’ s girls, don ’ t you think? ”
    “ Hmm, same red hair, if that ’ s what you mean. Only saw her once, at that corn husking party at Gebers ’ . ”
    “ Albert took a shine to her, and so did Fred, ” said Emma. “ She told