An Untamed Land (44 page)

This afternoon she would make sure he had time to read, something he’d almost rather do than eat. She settled into her chair to feed the nuzzling baby. “I’ll do the dishes in a bit. You find your book and read to me if you will.”

Thorliff’s eyes lit up, and he dived into the box under his bed where he kept his treasures. Roald had brought a copy of
Pilgrim’s Progress
from town for the boy’s birthday last fall. Already the pages were beginning to look worn, he’d read it so many times. Once Kaaren had started teaching the children last winter, Thorliff had taken to reading as though he’d known it all his life and hungered for every written word. He could even read parts of the Bible. He’d started with the stories of his hero, David.

Thorliff flipped eagerly to the page marked carefully with a bit of paper and began reading about Pilgrim and his trials. Once in a while he became stuck on a word and spelled it out, bringing Ingeborg back from her land of recollections to answer him. She looked across to the boy seated at the table next to the lamp, which, at best, gave poor light. If she didn’t know there was a window, she couldn’t tell by looking at the wall. Roald was taking an awful long time. She shivered again at the howling of the wind; it was worse than the wolves’.

When Andrew lay sleeping in her arms, she rose and put him back in his cradle, then picked up her knitting and sat again, one foot on the rocker to lull him back to sleep. She pulled her shawl more snugly around her shoulders. With the temperature dropping,
even the cookstove didn’t keep the soddy warm.

When Roald finally blew in with enough snow to fill the pan again, he stomped his feet. “Sweep me off, Thorliff, before we have a mud puddle here.” He looked across at Ingeborg. “This is the worst I’ve seen. I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face, and if it weren’t for that rope, I never would have made it back to the house. The trail filled in behind me that quick.” He shook his head. “I wish I had marked a trail over to Carl’s. Now that I think of it, we could have set six-foot posts and strung a line between them to follow. Why didn’t I think of that sooner?”

“Because you never expected a storm like this. One good thing, the snow covering the soddy will help keep us warmer.” Without her seeming to pay attention, her fingers kept looping the yarn over the needles as if they had a life of their own, round and round, the sock length growing by the minute.

“Mor?”

“Ja.” She smiled at the question on Thorliff’s face. “I know, the presents.”

“And the special treat?” He closed his book and rose to store it safely away.

“That too.”

Roald finished pulling off his boots and set them by the stove to dry. “I wish I had a way to see if Carl is all right.”

Ingeborg looked around from where she was fetching supplies from the shelves curtained by a length of gathered calico. “Why are you so concerned?”

Roald rubbed the side of his nose. “You know last week when we were in town?”

Ingeborg nodded, measuring sugar into the pan she’d set to heat.

“Well, there was talk about many people succumbing to the influenza. They called it an epidemic.”

“But you weren’t there long.”

“No, but Carl said the baby had been up all night, and he was coughing himself. What if he is too sick to care for his stock?”

“Not Carl. Nothing would keep him from chores.” Ingeborg stirred as the mixture began to bubble.

“What is it, Mor?” Thorliff stood at her elbow, watching everything she did.

“You’ll see.”

“Do you know, Far?”

“I’ll never tell.”

“It’s candy!” Thorliff breathed in reverence as Ingeborg lifted the spoon to watch a fine thread reach back to the pan.

“Quick, fill the pan with snow and pack it down tight.” Ingeborg moved to the cooler part of the stove and kept on stirring.

Roald held the door to keep it from slamming against the wall while Thorliff scooped the tin pan full. Shutting the door against the wind was more of a problem. Snow drifted through the opening in spite of their best efforts. Roald threw his weight against the stubborn door, and Thorliff dropped the bar in place.

While Thorliff watched in awe, Ingeborg drizzled the sweet syrup on the snow, making circles, loops, and figure eights.

“At home we called this snow candy. It tastes best at Christmas.”

While the hot syrup melted down into the snow, the pattern remained when she lifted out a section and broke it off to share between Roald and Thorliff. She grinned and closed her eyes to better savor the treat. Were they making snow candy in Norway today? Last year she hadn’t dared use the precious sugar for such a frivolous thing. So much to be thankful for.

“Now the presents?”

“Now.”

Each of them scurried to a different part of the room where they had hidden their treasures. Ingeborg dug in her knitting basket for hers. Late at night she’d cut pieces from Roald’s worn-out shirts and sewn one for Thorliff. After bleaching out any stains, she had dyed it yellow, using the onion skins as Metis had shown her.

He held it up to his chest. “And the sleeves are even long enough.” His eyes lit up. “Thank you, Mor.”

“This is for you too.” Far handed him a small, oblong package. Thorliff carefully removed the paper and stopped stock still.

“My own knife.” He stroked the mother-of-pearl handle and opened one blade, testing the edge with his thumb as he’d seen his father do innumerable times. He glanced up.

“No, it is not sharpened yet. You and I will do that together, and then you must always keep a good edge on it. That way it will be ready when you need it. And if you keep carving like you have been, you will need to sharpen it regularly.”

“Thank you, thank you.” Thorliff folded the blade closed and put the knife in his pocket.

“And for you.” Roald gave Ingeborg a wrapped package also.

“But I already got my present.” She looked from him to her stove. “You said that was Merry Christmas.” All the while she deftly untied
the string and smoothed out the paper. “Oh.” She could think of nothing else to say. Words just weren’t enough. Folded in her lap lay blue silk, the color of the summer prairie sky when the blue of the sky and the green of the new grass made her eyes and heart ache with the beauty of it. She lifted the fold of fabric and held it to her cheek. Silk. Such a silly, useless fabric for life on the prairie, and yet so wonderful. She quickly wiped a tear away lest the treasure be stained.

She looked up at Roald to catch a small smile tugging at his lips. “I hoped you would like it.”

“Like it!” She shook her head, keeping the fabric to her face.

“You maybe could wear it to church—when we get one, that is.”

“Ja, to church.” She couldn’t keep her hand still, stroking the fabric as though she’d never felt such richness. “Oh, such a wondrous gift made me nearly forget.” She handed Roald a parcel she dug out.

“New gloves.” He immediately pulled on the deerskin gloves, smoothing them down snugly over his fingers. “Perfect fit.”

“And this.” She added a second package.

“Mittens?” These were also of deerskin, but this time with the hair left on and fashioned on the inside.

“You can wear both of them at the same time to keep your hands really warm. Or you can wear these woolen ones as inner lining.” She gave him the third gift. “I rubbed the gloves with bear grease so they should keep out the water.”

“Your mor wants to make sure I have warm hands,” Roald said, removing the mittens. “Here, you try them on.”

Thorliff giggled when his hands as well as part of his arms disappeared in the huge mittens. “My turn.” He took off the mittens and laid them in his father’s lap. Taking two small packages out from behind the rocking chair, he gave one to Mor and the other to Far. “Mor, you go first.”

Ingeborg slowly unwrapped the bit of fabric. “A butter paddle! How perfect.” She rubbed the smooth, curved surface over the palm of her hand. “You know I needed one. Thank you, Thorly.”

“Far, your turn.”

“A belt. Did you carve this too?”

“Onkel Carl helped me. He tried it on and said if it was big enough for him, I should make it this much bigger.” He held two fingers about two inches apart. “It would fit you. Does it?”

Roald measured it around his waist. “Did you make the buckle also?” He stroked the metal.

“No, maybe next year. I am not so good at the forge yet. Onkel Carl said to tell you I did it, but I didn’t.”

“You did a fine job, son. You have many talents, just as a good Bjorklund man should.”

Ingeborg could feel the joy radiating from the boy at his father’s words. Smiles and words of praise from her husband. Those alone were enough to make her thankful this Christmas.

After a meal of leftovers from the feast, the family went to bed early to conserve on the firewood. Ingeborg lay beside the gently snoring Roald, hugging the pleasures and wonders of the day close in her heart, like Mary of old. The beauty of the words Thorliff had read rolled through her mind. “And Mary wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, for there was no room for them in the inn.” If she closed her ears against the wind’s howling, could she hear the angels singing?

The storm took two more days to blow over. The silence awoke Ingeborg sometime in the night.
Thank you, heavenly Father, that you have kept us safe through this storm.
She fell back asleep, nestled close to the warm body of her husband.

In the morning, as soon as Roald finished the chores, he headed across the frozen drifts for Carl’s house.

Ingeborg set bread to rising and rinsed the beans she’d been soaking to make baked beans. After adding the molasses, onion, and chunks of salt pork, she placed the bubbling pan in the oven. Perhaps the Baards would try to come today, and they would all have dinner here. With that thought and hope in mind, she set the goose carcass to boiling for soup. The Baard young’uns could about eat them out of house and home.

Roald came bursting through the door. “Ingeborg! Oh, Ingeborg! Come help me, quick! Carl and Kaaren are too sick to get out of bed, and little Gunny is gone.”

N
o, God, no. Oh, Father God, be with us.” She murmured the prayer as she dried her hands on her apron and reached for her coat. “Thorliff, you stay with Andrew. He should sleep for several hours. I will come home to feed him. You tend the stove and stay indoors. It is too bitterly cold out there for man or beast.” She tucked a jar of honey in a basket along with some herbs for cough and fever that Metis had taught her to use. All the while, thoughts of Gunny, their bright-eyed laughing child, tore through her. She couldn’t be dead. Not like this. She just couldn’t.

But she was. When Ingeborg walked in the room, the smell of death and putrid sickness nearly brought her to her knees. Roald was already sponging his brother’s body, trying to bring down the raging fever. And raging was the only word to describe Carl. He screamed at whatever demons tormented his mind and took a swing at Roald that was mocking in its weakness.

Kaaren lay comatose with baby Lizzie beside her, both of them lying in a pool of vomit and urine. Ingeborg took the baby, cleaned her up, and wrapped the quiet form in another quilt. Lizzie’s tiny chest barely rose with each breath, the skin so hot Ingeborg could only think to dunk the baby in a cool bath.

When she tried to dribble warm milk in the flaccid mouth, Lizzie gagged, and the milk ran down her cheek. Ingeborg gave the baby a sponge bath and laid a cool cloth on her chest. Unable to think of anything else to do, she returned to care for Kaaren.

But before she began stripping the sheets, she bent over Gunny’s trundle bed. The small form lay still and cold, her skin waxen, colorless. Ingeborg touched the small perfect lips with one finger in
farewell. She covered the child’s face with the patchwork quilt Kaaren had so lovingly made.

Ingeborg could hear her mother’s voice, clearer than she had for some time.
Tend to the living. Where there is life, there is hope
. For Gunny, hope was no longer needed. The little girl now rested in the Father’s arms.

She rolled the soiled sheets in a ball and struggled to work Kaaren’s nightgown over her head. Even though it wasn’t proper, Roald would have to help put a clean one back on. After sponging off Kaaren’s hot body and repeatedly changing the cold cloth for another, she could feel Kaaren’s burning temperature begin to subside.

From across the room as she checked on the baby, she could hear the rattle in Carl’s chest. Would an onion plaster help? If only she had two more pairs of hands. But first, if she didn’t get some liquid into these people, they would burn up.

Her back ached, and she knew Andrew must be screaming his head off by now, but still she kept on. Finally, she put the baby back in bed with Kaaren so she could care for the two of them together. Lizzie was still unable to swallow, and milk just drooled out the side of her mouth. Over and over she dipped the cloths in cold water, wrung them out, and laid them back over hot skin. Finally Kaaren swallowed a bit of water, then some of the tea Ingeborg had brewed from willow bark.