"I heard him say that ninety-five per cent of them are good and he wouldn't care to cross the border without his gun! Oh, I do wish we'd stayed in Missouri!"

"In Missouri I was just a hired man," Mr. Simpson reminded her.

"But we always had enough, and we were happy. To give it up and take these awful risks!"

"Now, Ann," Cindy's father's voice became firm, "this is the Simpsons' chance, perhaps the only one we'll ever have, to rise in the world. There may be some small risk, but nobody ever gained anything without risking something. Think of the children, and of how much more we'll be able to give them if we have our own farm instead of depending on a hired man's wages."

"But there aren't even any schools out there!"

"There will be," Jed Simpson said. "Schools will follow on the heels of the settlers. So will roads, towns, and even cities! And do you know who one schoolteacher might be?"

"Who?"

"Mrs. Jed Simpson."

"Jed!"

"I mean it, Ann. You're a college graduate. And stop thinking of Oklahoma as an empty wilderness. It may be that now, but within a week it'll be settled. And it will need more than farmers. We'll need doctors, carpenters, storekeepers, and above all, schoolteachers. Working together, with each contributing to the best of his ability, we'll build a new and mighty state!"

There was a short silence, and then Ann Simpson spoke again.

"Forgive me, Jed," she said. "Knowing you, I should have known that you would have no small plan. Yes, I see it too, and I will be a schoolteacher if we have to hold our first school in the open air. I won't promise not to worry, and I won't be happy until I'm with you again, and please take your gun!"

"I'll take it," Jed Simpson promised her.

Cindy dropped off to sleep and almost immediately fell into a happy dream. She was mounted on one of Pete's ponies. Free as a bird and swift as the wind, she skimmed over the enticing grasslands just across the border to help her father and Pete stake claims.

Cindy rolled over and cried out in her sleep. The man with cat's eyes had crept into her dream and made it a troubled one. She awakened shivering, and did not go back to sleep for nearly an hour. But when she did, there were no more dreams.

The next time she awakened, she smelled wood smoke and heard people moving about. Breakfast fires were being kindled at every camp and wagon. Cindy sat up in bed, and Mindy stirred beside her. Very softly, Cindy patted her sister's cheek.

"It's morning," she said.

"Oh-h! So it is!" Mindy stretched and sat up drowsily.

Mindy donned the dress she had worn last night, but Cindy reached into her own carpetbag for some underwear, blue jeans, and a shirt that Alec had worn when he was ten. The clothing just fitted her if she turned up the jeans' cuffs and rolled the shirt sleeves to her elbows. It was not quite a lady's garb, but it offered much more freedom than any clinging dress. Eyes wide with astonishment, Mindy stared at her sister.

"Cindy!" she exclaimed.

"I want to save my dresses," Cindy said.

"What will Mother say?"

"She doesn't care," said Cindy, who was not at all sure just what Mother would say. "I wore these all the way out here."

They slipped out the back flaps of the wagon to find their mother building a breakfast fire. She greeted the twins, smiled, and in her heart Cindy gave thanks for an understanding mother who, while wishing her daughters to be ladylike, knew why girls sometimes thought boys had all the fun. Their father was grooming Sunshine, and Alec was giving the mules their hay.

"Time you were up, sleepyheads!" Alec called cheerfully when he saw the twins.

Mindy smiled, Cindy made a face at her brother, and both turned to help their mother. Mindy, who had had no camp experience but had always helped in the kitchen, mixed pancake batter. Cindy cut slices from a side of bacon and arranged the tableware. Their mother put the big coffee pot over the fire and got out her griddle.

"I'll do the cooking if you want me to," Cindy offered.

"No, thank you, dear," her mother declined. "I'll feel better if I keep busy."

"Hello, neighbors."

Granny Brent had come out of her wagon and was about to start a breakfast fire. White-haired and wrinkled, but not stooped or stiff, Granny had spent much time in wagons and knew exactly how to do everything. She smiled in her wonderfully gentle fashion.

"Well, well! So the other twin has arrived! Do come here, child, and let me look at you!"

Mindy went trustingly over to become acquainted with Granny Brent. Cindy and Alec and their father waved gaily to the old lady, and Mrs. Simpson's face became less troubled. Granny and Gramps were living proof that people could dare to cross a new frontier and live. They'd come to Kansas many years ago, and this was to be their third homestead.

Mrs. Simpson pushed the sizzling bacon slices to one side, poured batter onto the hot griddle. As soon as they were cooked, she scooped the golden-brown pancakes into a covered dish that was near enough to the fire to stay warm. Finally she called:

"Breakfast!"

The family ate hungrily for, as the children's mother remarked, it did seem that life in the open air gave all of them the appetites of horses that had gone without hay for a week. As soon as everyone had finished, Mr. Simpson went over to plan with Pete Brent. Cindy got out the big dishpan and Mindy prepared to help her, but again Mrs. Simpson waved them aside.

"Leave the dish washing up to me," she said. "I must have something to do. You children run along, and Cindamine, please stay out of trouble."

"I will," Cindy promised.

"Let's take a walk," Alec suggested.

The three children walked south along the line of camps, marveling at the people who had gathered here.

Next to Pete Brent's wagon was a lean and fiercely bearded man who had no camp except a bed roll thrown on the ground. He had no possessions except the bed roll, a few cooking utensils, and a beautiful race horse that he was forever either grooming or exercising. He was grooming it when the children passed, and they hurried because the bearded man was an unfriendly person who seldom spoke to anyone.

Then came three camps, one behind the other. The first belonged to an old man with a sorry-looking mule and a small tent. A little to one side and about thirty feet away was a tent belonging to two young men who owned a smart buggy, or light wagon, drawn by two handsome horses. The young men seemed little interested in anything except having a good time. Directly behind them was another wagon occupied by a tired-looking man, an equally tired woman, and four lively children. Scrawled in black paint on the wagon's cover was:

FROZE OUT IN MINNYSOTA. FLOODED OUT IN ILLYNOIS. BURNT OUT IN NEBRASKY. GRASSHOPPERED OUT IN KANSAS. MAKE OUT IN OKLYHOMY.

For as far as the children could see in either direction were tents, wagons, bed rolls, and even a few caves dug into the earth. These camps were occupied by men, women, and children who, almost without exception, had two things in common. They were very poor people who had never been able to buy land of their own, and they had never given up the idea that to have some would be glorious. So these they shared: poverty and dreams. There were very few among them whose camps, rigs, teams, or dress indicated that they had any money to spare.