Bittersweet Bliss (Saskatchewan Saga Book #5): A Novel (8 page)

“No, not that,” Big Tiny said humbly.

“If an Indian man had two wives,” Birdie said, “he couldn’t be baptized. So what did he do? How did he solve the problem?” Almost grinding her teeth at the injustice of it all, she continued, “One wife was... discarded.”

“Discarded?” Big Tiny asked cautiously.

“It was the
way
he did it! The Indian
male
took his wife out in the canoe, presumably fishing. When he returned, he was alone. Next day,” Birdie’s eyes glittered, “he went to receive the drops of holy water.”

“Thank Gott,” Big Tiny said seriously, “our preacher don’t do things that way. We just need to accept Jesus—”

“Yes, yes,” Birdie acknowledged. “A much better system. But where were we?”

“The pipe stem—” Big Tiny recalled.

“It was pointed to the east and west, north and south. Then the Indians, satisfied that the proper courtesy had been shown the Cree people, sat down on the grass, prepared to treat.”

“Oh, ya.” Big Tiny shifted his massive weight, and the slight motion broke the spell in which Birdie had found herself.

“My goodness! How I do run on! You are a good listener, Mr. Kruger. I’ve completely forgotten the time.”

“You’re a good teacher, Miss Wharton. It’s too bad,” he said, brightening, “there aren’t classes for us grownups. Maybe night classes for people like me who want to learn more, particularly about our country. Did you ever think of that?”

“Why, Mr. Kruger,” Birdie said, pleased in spite of herself, “it seems a wonderful suggestion.”

“But of course not in summer,” Big Tiny said regretfully. “Maybe in the fall, do you think?”

“It’s certainly something to think about. Now,” Birdie was all business, “was there something you wanted to see me about?”

“I was just going by on my way home from the store, and I thought Little Tiny—Nelman—might like a ride. But I see he’s gone—”

“Yes, they’re all gone. I think I let them go a little early.” Birdie, recalling her strange mood of earlier in the day and remembering why it had seemed important for the children to clear out, cast a glance toward the letter on her desk.

“Well then,” Big Tiny said, twisting his hat a little, looking at her steadily, “would you like a ride? I go right by the Blooms’, you know.”

So that’s what it was all about! Birdie, who had almost been beguiled into some semblance of camaraderie—two pioneers devoted to learning more about their adopted country—stiffened immediately.

“I’m not ready to go home yet,” she said tightly, and Big Tiny Kruger turned toward the door. If he were disappointed, it didn’t show on his broad, pleasant, sun-browned face.

“But thank you,” she added belatedly, and Big Tiny bowed in her direction slightly, put his disreputable hat on his head, and slipped out as silently as he had come.

Staring at the doorway, empty indeed since the large figure of the man disappeared from it, Birdie Wharton’s lips tightened.
Why would anyone be interested in a... creature like that, when
this
awaits
?

Her eyes dropped to the envelope. In spite of herself she felt a tug, if not on her heart, then on her imagination.

I
t was Saturday, time to do all the pre-Sunday chores that fell to a homemaker. Ellie lifted a cake from the oven, thrust a broom straw into it, deemed it done, and set it aside to cool for Sunday dinner.

Bliss churchgoers took literally the admonition of Exodus 20:9–10, “Six days shalt thou labour... but the seventh day is the sabbath of the L
ORD
thy God.” Saturday night would find not only Sunday’s clothes sponged, pressed, and ready for donning the next morning and shoes cleaned and polished but the house spic-and-span as well. Sunday’s dinner would be ready—pie or cake covered and waiting, fresh buns baked and awaiting reheating, vegetables peeled and set in water overnight.

At least, Ellie always thought, cleaning up the kitchen for the last time Saturday night, perhaps consoling herself for her single estate, there were no children’s baths to give, no little heads to wash. Having been a part of the bathing ritual for many years, she was well accustomed to the Saturday night regimen—dragging in the zinc tub, setting it before the stove and filling it with water, climbing in, doubling up, washing from head to toe.

Growing up the youngest member of the Bonney family, she had the privilege of the first bath. After she was off to bed, her
parents took turns, first Serena, presumably not as dusty and dirty as her husband, then Bran, scrubbing away the week’s grime. Ellie always felt sorry for her father having to bathe in used bathwater, but he laughed at her concern and assured her he didn’t mind her “little bit of clean dirt.”

Thinking of those days, Ellie couldn’t refrain from smiling, almost chuckling aloud, as memory took her back to that day of the Busy Bees’ first assignment: the scrubbing of the heads of the Nikolai children—all but the baby who wouldn’t be pried away from his mother’s arms. The startled parents, probably puzzled at the practices of these new-country people, had submitted with good nature as the girls arrived, soap and towels in hand, to set up basins on old tree stumps in the yard, fill them with water brought from the range’s reservoir, and, one by one, bend the matted blond heads of the children and begin soaping. An assembly line of sorts had been devised, with Marfa and Vonnie washing, Flossy rinsing, and Ellie combing. The Busy Bees had left the Nikolai farm that day riding the crest of satisfaction for a good deed well done. Though they would have liked to, they knew themselves to be too young to give the overburdened mother the stern injunction, “These heads should be washed every Saturday night!”

Tucking away the memory—the inauguration of the Busy Bees’ pursuits—Ellie returned to her preparations for Sunday.

She had been well taught; Serena had automatically performed duty after duty, week after week, year after year and, as a good mother, had instructed the daughter who was always at her side.

The final task remaining to Ellie this Saturday was to search out a chicken—the unlucky one that didn’t scurry squawking away as quickly as the others—chop off its head, scald and pluck it, clean it, and hang it down the well. Sunday morning, before leaving for church, she would put it into a roasting pan and pop it into the oven. With the firebox stoked with wood and the damper adjusted, dinner should be ready and waiting when she and her father got home. It was a good system; all over Bliss it would be in effect. A good system and, they believed, a godly one.

But there was good sense mixed with bush beliefs. Did not Jesus himself say, when he was criticized for healing on the Sabbath, “Doth not each one of you on the sabbath loose his ox or his ass from the stall, and lead him away to watering?” (Luke 13:15).

In the Canadian bush, not only was there the watering of animals but feeding and milking as well. And if a cow should decide to give birth on a Sunday, or if a horse cut itself on barbed wire, had not the “ox fallen into a pit,” and did not the Lord make allowance for that? And did not his Word say, “He also that is slothful in his work is brother to him that is a great waster” (Prov. 18:9)? Waste, as far as the bush people were concerned, was a sin of major proportions. Obviously it went hand-in-hand with sloth. Yes, certain chores had to be done on Sunday, as any day. But there were many that could be taken care of beforehand. Saturday was a busy day.

“Let’s see...,” Ellie said thoughtfully to nobody but Wrinkles. Wrinkles, ensconced regally on a cushion in a chair, viewed the Sunday preparations with tolerance, having seen them before, as had his ancestors, back and back to the first Wrinkles, so named by a small Ellie because his skin fit him so loosely. “I believe I’ll just go out to the garden and pull a few radishes and have them ready for tomorrow.”

At last—fresh vegetables, after many months of no green thing. A plain lettuce salad, radishes gleaming like rubies in a simple crockery saucer on the table—these were first. First, and as treasured as though they were gems of incomparable worth. They were the forerunners to peas and new potatoes. Could any dish on a king’s table surpass a bowl of tender new potatoes and peas, creamed and slathered with sweet butter? Gardens in Bliss received much tender, loving care, rewarding their keepers by prodigious growth, as though they knew the time was short for performing and producing. In actuality, it was the long growing hours of the brief summer days—when the sun came early and stayed late—that caused garden and grain to spring forth as though by some magic. Summers, short and hot, could result in excellent crops, but often lack of rain brought discouraging harvests. Tightening their belts in the lean years, thanking God for
the good ones, the people of the bush persisted, endured, and slowly, slowly moved ahead.

Taking a small basket, Ellie proceeded to the garden, followed by Wrinkles, who wound himself around her legs, tail aloft, when she paused at the radish row. She bent to rub his head, only to straighten at the sound of a well-known voice.

“Hey, Ellie!” It was Tom.

Freeing herself from the cloying cat, Ellie turned with glad steps toward the approaching buggy.

“Tom! Whatever are you doing in the middle of the morning on a busy Saturday?”

“I’ve called it a day, Ellie, as far as field work is concerned. And that’s because my plow should be in. I’m on my way to Prince Albert to get it.”Tom, usually relaxed, comfortable, casual, revealed his satisfaction in the acquisition of the new plow by the lilt to his voice and the pleased expression on his face. He had not ordered a gang or sulky plow, or even a subsoil lister—all of which were available and often used on the prairie and in the bush. Instead, Tom had ordered and would put to good use the Brush Plow. Having cleared another portion of his land’s dense growth, he thought this plow, intended for “new and brushy land, where there are stumps and roots,” would be invaluable, saving time and much human effort.

“Good!” Ellie responded. “That didn’t take long, did it? Have you got time to come in, maybe have a cup of coffee?”

“I’ve got to get on my way; I need to make it back for chores. But Ellie—could I persuade you to come with me?”

Ellie’s eyes lit; it was what she needed—a break in the work, a lift to her spirits. Nothing could do it like time spent with Tom.

“Why not!” she answered impulsively. “I’ll take the opportunity to shop a little, perhaps.”

“Why not!” he mimicked, grinning. “Hustle along, then, while I get turned around.”

Hastily changing her clothes, straightening her hair, and washing her hands and face, Ellie was soon ready. Hunting a scrap of paper and a pencil, she wrote her father a note and left it propped on the table.

I’m going to P.A. with Tom. Beans should be ready on the back of the stove. The cake is for tomorrow, but there’s fruitcake in the bread box! I’ll be home in time to fix supper.

Breathless, she ran for the buggy and Tom. He reined the horse steady while she clambered up into the seat beside him, eyes more green than hazel, strands of hair curling in careless abandon around her face, flushed by the sun and the exertion of the last few minutes.

“Sorry I didn’t give you any warning,” he said, slacking up on the reins and turning the buggy toward the road, admiring her all the while with his eyes. “But as spontaneous as you are, dear Ellie, I knew it’d be no problem.”

Tom knew her well. Ellie smiled and settled back, prepared to enjoy the ride to town (Bliss was termed a hamlet), the unexpected break from work, and being with Tom. It had been here, on this road, they had first met...

Her father called good-bye as she left for school, raising a ruckus among the assembled chickens until a great fervor of cackles accompanied her departure. That familiarity and her mother’s wave from the stoop sent her off to her day happy and content. Parents might suffer anxiety, discouragement, and despair, but Bliss’s children would remember the warmth of the small home, the loving arms, the good friends, and the security they provided.

The current Wrinkles accompanied her to the road, where he disappeared into the bush, hopefully to a day of mousing; mice in the bush were a scourge on a par with gophers and rabbits and crows.