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Show Idealism, Unrequited Love, and Glorious Understanding 97 running boards of the car they drove to Pine The were kept in a small chickens Valley. coop near the shed. were lashed to the Each morning John let the chickens out to scratch in the woods for food, and they returned to the coop each evening to roost. The day the family loaded their car to return to Salt Lake City, the chickens were still in the woods, impossible to catch. The family decided they had to wait until dark when the chick ens would return. About four in the afternoon a car rumbled into the yard. Out jumped Harold Silver and his younger twenty-three-year-old brother, Richard (Dick). They had driven to Dinosaur National Monument at Vernal and had decided to return to Ogden by way of Wolf Creek Pass. Harold wanted to show the ranch to Dick (and see Madelyn). Seeing that the Stewarts were packed, Harold volunteered to fill his car with people or suitcases to relieve the crowding. Father Barnard had a better idea, "Why don't you and Dick wait for the chickens to come in to roost? Then you can put the chickens in their crates and take them to the city. Madelyn and Nora can stay and help you." The four remained, ate a picnic from the basket that Mother Leonora had prepared. About dark, when the chickens returned they were placed in traveling boxes and secured to the car running boards. As they drove down the canyon, Madelyn sat on the front seat with Harold; Nora and Dick were in the back. Madelyn had brought along her ukelele and accompanied the four as they sang popular songs. "Madelyn was alive and happy and young," wrote Nora." Her friendship with Harold took a warm turn. School was about to start and Madelyn had to decide whether to resume teaching. Should she stay home and look after mother and her little brothers and sisters now that Ruth was married and living in Washington, D.C.? Or should she return to enjoy her classes and students as she had done for five years? She was still disquieted by "the thing" she had had with Caldwell. She vowed to throw it off before Thanksgiving and she returned to teaching. On Armistice Day, November 11, Harold sent her thirteen red roses (one wonders if there was sig nificance in thirteen). She responded warmly: |
