There were elegiac descriptions of the advantages to come, but once the magic word ‘west’ was in print, nobody needed them. Even in the Stokes’ wooden house there was a frisson of real excitement. My grandfather thought of the grass that had billowed around him on his first attempt at escape, when he was too small to see his way through it, and knew that nothing could stop him this time.

On the back page of that same special edition of the Sentinel a small item caught Miss Emelina McClanahan’s eye.

ANNOUNCEMENT

The Everett Elias Madison Scholarship for Farm Bred Boys from Kansas will choose its first scholar for entrance in the freshman class of 1876 at the University of Kansas in Lawrence. Applicants must be Kansas born and bred. They must be from local farms, and they must have received their schooling from local teachers.

Miss Emelina never doubted that this first scholar was going to be George. During the years she’d been teaching, she’d gained confidence and prestige; that mound of bodice had grown more formidable, her petticoats whiter and starchier; she talked firmly to Alvah. As a result, George had private lessons when he wasn’t out selling.

One hot night in September, George visited Jonathan in the sod hut. ‘I saw your light,’ he said; Jonathan had no light, nor any means of fueling one. Despite the heat George wore his frock coat; he carried the satchel he took with him when he was out on his rounds. ‘Thought I’d come calling.’

Jonathan gestured non-committally and stood aside. The roof of the soddy hung low over their heads; the turf that made up the ceiling trailed with dead weeds that dangled down over ears and into eyes. The night was the kind of night that even middle-westerners dread, hot enough to drown in; without air-conditioning, the only way of getting to sleep is to lie under a damp sheet in the draft from the doorway. The soddy’s one window didn’t open; there was no draft. There had never been a bed; and as for a sheet, Jonathan knew the word from the McGuffey readers but, as he says in his diaries, he had not been able to figure out precisely what purpose such a large square of cloth was supposed to serve.

‘Bought us light and drink,’ George said. He took a candle out of his pocket, lit it, stuck it into the soddy floor; then he took out a bottle and a couple of tin cups. ‘Thought we ought to drink to better times.’ He filled the cups and handed one to Jonathan. ‘Come on, drink up,’ he said, ‘here’s to you,’ and tossed back the contents of his own cup.

Jonathan studied the liquid, sniffed it. He’d stolen milk straight from the cow; he’d drunk water.

‘Ain’t going to bite you,’ George said. ‘It’s a peace offering. Come on, drink up.’

‘Why?’

‘Why what?’

‘You ain’t here to make peace with me.’

‘You afraid to drink this stuff? Huh?’ It was probably 110-proof red, an evil bathtub brew of bourbon touched up with turpentine and lye, enough to take rust off metal, enough to skin cats alive. But Jonathan was only fourteen or so, and young males are among the stupidest of the stupid young, competitive where the prize is worthless and fiercely proud where pride is meaningless: he drank, shuddered, gasped, choked and recovered, eyes watering, throat aflame. ‘Another?’ George said, refilling the cup.