Page:So Big (1924).djvu/135

 got to use tile drainage. And—wait a minute—humus. I know what humus is. It’s decayed vegetables. There’s always a pile by the side of the barn; and you’ve been using it on the quick land. All the west sixteen isn’t clay. Part of it’s muckland. All it needs is draining and manure. With potash, too, and phosphoric acid.”

Pervus laughed a great hearty laugh that Selina found surprisingly infuriating. He put one great brown hand patronizingly on her flushed cheek; pinched it gently.

“Don’t!” said Selina, and jerked her head away. It was the first time she had ever resented a caress from him.

Pervus laughed again. “Well, well, well! School teacher is a farmer now, huh? I bet even Widow Paarlenberg don’t know as much as my little farmer about”—he exploded again—“about this, now, potash and—what kind of acid? Tell me, little Lina, from where did you learn all this about truck farming?”

“Out of a book,” Selina said, almost snappishly. “I sent to Chicago for it.”

“A book! A book!” He slapped his knee. “A vegetable farmer out of a book.”

“Why not! The man who wrote it knows more about vegetable farming than anybody in all High Prairie. He knows about new ways. You're running the farm just the way your father ran it.”

“What was good enough for my father is good enough for me.”