To Everything a Season (4 page)

I
ngeborg caught herself studying Haakan.

“Mange takk,” he said, pushing back from the breakfast table and standing.

He didn't look any different. Surely she was worrying for nothing.
Lord, I know you
don't want your children worrying, and I know better
 . . . but . . . but this is Haakan.
Peace trickled into her heart like cool water on a hot day. She sucked in and exhaled, letting the worry float away on the peace.

“We'll be done with the seeding today, a good two weeks early. Thank God for spring. I was beginning to think winter was going to hang on forever. Then it was like a door opening and closing.”

Ingeborg nodded. “Andrew is not here yet. Would you like another cup of coffee?”

“Takk, but I think not. Are you going to town to see how Inga is faring?”

“You know me too well.” She stepped into his arms instead of around him. “I know a simple break like that is not life threatening, but it sure tugs on this heart of mine.”

He rested his chin on the top of her head. “I liked having more
time with our grandchildren this winter. With Inga in school, Carl . . .” He paused and did an oh-so-familiar soft sound somewhere between a chuckle and a snort. Inga called it Grandpa's snuckle. She loved coming up with new words. And many of them were so appropriate.

“I will put the dinner in the oven first and then go. Andrew went home after milking, and Freda is over helping Kaaren today, since they are deep cleaning all the dormitory rooms. You know how the young men are talking about calling or writing for more help from Norway? Women need to be included in that.” She paused, then looked up at Haakan so she could watch his face. “What if I wrote to my family and asked if anyone wants to come to North Dakota? I've not heard from anyone for so long. But then, I have been remiss in writing too.”

He cocked his head to the side just a bit, then nodded. “We've pretty much brought over all the Bjorklunds. Maybe it's time to include your family, the Strands, and anyone they might know of. We have so much to share, and when I read the paper, I can see times are still hard there.” He looked off into the distance. “We need to talk with Thorliff and the others so we are all thinking along the same line.” He paused and listened to the dog bark his I-know-you welcome. “Ah. Andrew is back at the barn.” He hugged Ingeborg close. “I like it being just the two of us for a change.”

“Me too.” She hugged him back and walked him to the door, where he lifted his hat from the peg on the wall and slid his arms into a light jacket.

He stopped. “You are getting over that Emmy will be leaving again when her uncle comes for her? I know you miss having her here.”

“I am. Inga does not like her grandma to have sad eyes. But Inga misses her too. They have become so close.”

“Uff da. That child.” This time a true chuckle floated over his shoulder as he strode down the steps. Not a snuckle.

Ingeborg watched him go.
Keep him safe, O Lord.
Her prayer joined the twittering of the nesting birds rising on the slight breeze. A perfect spring day. She should be out in the garden instead of thinking of going to see Inga. Several of the deaf students had come over and helped with the planting so that all but the most tender plants were already planted and some were showing bits of green pushing through the rich black soil. They had planted what they could at the huge garden at the deaf school too. Two students had remained to help over the summer. They were good workers, those students.

“A snuckle indeed. Thank you, Lord, for my family.” She watched through the screen door as Andrew and his far hooked up the two teams to the drills and drove out of the yard. “Ja, and uff da too. Get yourself going.”

At least she had baked bread the day before, and Freda had butchered one of the old hens, so making chicken and dumplings would be easy. She set the pot on the stove, filled it halfway with hot water from the reservoir, and fetched the hen from the icebox to add to the stewpot. Then after chopping the few remaining onions and potatoes, she added sage and salt and pepper and put it all in the kettle. Once it came to a boil on the top of the stove, she slid the deep pot into the oven to slow cook all morning.

She beat two eggs, added salt and dried parsley, wild onion and thyme, along with flour to make a stiff dough for the dumplings. Putting the bowl in the icebox, she headed for the cellar to fetch canned beans, both green and hulled beans, corn, and tomatoes to add when she returned home. With dinner all set, she hung up her apron and picked up the basket she had filled earlier with cookies and dried apple slices—Inga's favorite things. Not
that Thelma didn't have similar, but she knew how much Inga would enjoy a basket of Grandma makings.

Her straw hat had replaced her winter one, but she left it hanging on the peg. She was not ready for sunbonnets yet. She wanted the sun on her face and on the rest of her. In the winter she so craved the sunshine that when spring arrived, she could never get enough warm sun to make up for the brief, cold sun that made the snow glitter in the winter.

Ah, what a day! A crow announced to the world that someone was coming through, the meadowlarks and song sparrows serenaded her, and a spider web sported dewdrops that rainbowed the sun. Up ahead, the wheat elevator and the flour mill stood taller than the trees growing back along the river. They had planted trees in Blessing too—cottonwoods, elm, oak, and maples—and all now sprouted their spring green finery. The two-story boardinghouse was growing a new wing, and the old granary had been expanded to house the machinery plant they built for manufacturing the additions to the seed drills, along with a line of new drills that incorporated the invention of Daniel Jeffers' deceased father. Whoever dreamed Blessing would grow like this?

Scooter, Inga's small dog, announced Ingeborg's arrival before she reached the gate to the fenced yard of the Bjorklund house.

“Grandma, you came to see me,” Inga shouted from the back porch, where she and her mother were having breakfast.

“Oh, Ingeborg, welcome.” Elizabeth rose from her chair and joined her daughter at the top step of the wide, roofed back porch. She kept a hand on Inga's shoulder, reminding her that jumping down the steps might not be a good idea.

“I broke my arm.” Inga pointed to the white sling that was now not only tied around her neck but to her body with another strip of sheeting.

“I see that.” Ingeborg handed Elizabeth the basket and cupped both hands around Inga's face. She kissed the little girl's nose before making her way to the white wicker settee, where she sat and waited for Inga to climb one-handed up beside her.

“Uff da, this thing is not good.” Inga leaned against her grandmother and looked up at her. “What did you bring?”

Elizabeth barked, “Inga! That is not polite.”

Inga sighed dramatically. “Takk, Grandma, for the basket.”

“How do you know it is for you?”

“Because you know how I love baskets, and I am sure there are cookies in there and dried apples and maybe some cheese. Am I right?”

“Mostly.” Ingeborg picked the basket off the table beside her and set it on her granddaughter's lap. Scooter leaped up beside her and stuck his nose into the basket too.

“Go away, Scooter. This is mine.”

He sat down beside her, one ear up and one down, which always gave him a questioning look.

“Thank you.” Inga lifted out the plate of gingerbread men with raisins for eyes, nose, smile, and three buttons down the front. “You know these are my favoritest in all the world.” She bit a leg off one, eating the cookie the way Astrid had taught her.

“Inga?” Her mother's tone was obviously of the reminder sort.

Inga scrunched up her face then heaved a sigh. “Would you like one of my cookies, Mor? Grandma?” Her face brightened. “And coffee?” She started to scoot forward, then flinched and stopped. She shook her head. “This thing hurts!”

“I'm sure it does.” Ingeborg wrapped an arm around the girl's shoulder and hugged her gently. “Did Emmy go to school?”

“Ja, but Ma wouldn't let me go.”

“Good idea. You can go back in tomorrow, most likely.”

“But I won't get any recess, and I'll have to stay after school.” The glower on her brow told her feelings on that matter. She chomped down on the other cookie leg.

Thelma brought a tray out and set it on the table with the coffee things and a plate of dried-apple kuchen. “I tried a new recipe, or rather, I altered an old one. I hope you like it.”

“No doubt as to that.”

Ingeborg looked to Elizabeth. “I take it Astrid is at the hospital?”

“Yes. I was supposed to take morning rounds, but she insisted I stay home with the princess here.”

Inga was picking the raisins off her gingerbread man and gave her mother a questioning look. “A broken princess?”

Both women rolled their eyes.

“Do you know what time it is?” Ingeborg asked.

“No. The clock is in the kitchen. Why?”

“I best not dawdle all day. I need to do some things at home.” She had started to lean back when a voice seemed to speak clearly:
Go home now
.

“Ingeborg, what is it?”

“I don't know. A voice is saying, ‘Go home now.'” She started to stand but sat back down. The command came more urgently.

Ingeborg stood up. Should she call Kaaren to see if she could see if anything was wrong at her house?

“Do you want Thorliff to bring up the horse and buggy?”

“No. I can walk it almost as fast.” She picked up her bag.

“Grandma, don't leave.” Inga's lower lip stuck out.

“I'm sorry, little one. I have to go home.”

“Call me,” Elizabeth called to her back.

“I will.” Ingeborg set out for home, walking as fast as she could.
Home. What was wrong? Was it Haakan? Andrew? Lord
God, keep them safe. Whatever is happening, you are there.
If that was your command, I am obeying as fast
as I can.
Her prayers matched her hurrying feet. She could hear a horse coming up behind her.

“Ingeborg, get in,” Pastor Solberg said as he stopped his buggy.

“Thank you, Lord. How did you know?” She climbed in, and as soon as she was seated, he set the horse into a fast trot.

“A voice telling me.”

“Me too. I was at Thorliff's to visit Inga.” She hung on to the arm of the seat, her feet braced against the floorboards as he turned the horse into the lane.

Ingeborg scanned the fields. She could see Andrew still seeding but no Haakan. They'd been in separate fields.

As soon as they trotted into the yard, they saw Haakan's team by the barn. Haakan, still in the seat of his seeder, was slumped forward. Pastor Solberg halted his horse a bit away to keep from startling the team. Ingeborg leaped out before the buggy had fully stopped and darted toward the man, seeing his arm crooked around the lever that closed the seed doors, the only thing keeping him on the seat. At the same moment, she realized with a jolt that if he weren't stuck there, he might've fallen and the seeder could have run over him.

Lord God, what is it? Is he
dead? Please don't let him be dead. He's
breathing. Thank you, Lord, he's breathing
. “He's unconscious,” she called to Pastor Solberg.

“I'm coming.”

She stood beside her husband, one hand checking the pulse in his neck, the other hand on his back. “No. Go ring the triangle so Andrew can come help.”

Solberg did as she said and, with the clanging still echoing across the field, ran back to Ingeborg.

“Can we get him off and lay him on the ground?”

“Haakan, can you hear me?” The
Lord God
litany rolled and rerolled in her mind all the while as she laid her cheek against his back to listen for his heart. Rapid beat but strong. So it wasn't his heart.

“I'm going to try to sit him up so we can unhook his arm.”

She could hear horses galloping. Andrew, astride one of his team, stopped them and leaped to the ground. “What is it?”

“We don't know.”

“With the two of us we can sit him up, unhook his arm, and get him off the seeder.”

“Unhitch the team. If they move . . .”

Ingeborg stood at the horses' noses, gripping the lines as Pastor Solberg unhitched one horse and Andrew the other. With the seeder tongue on the ground, they were better able to help Haakan.

“There are horse blankets in the barn on the wall.”

Ingeborg ran to get those. “We can lay him on one and carry him to the house that way.” She slid open the main door, retrieved two of the canvas blankets, and ran back outside.

With three of them working together they finally got Haakan stretched out on the blanket on the ground. Ingeborg knelt beside him, gently calling his name and feeling his arm to see if it was broken. No response.

Andrew looked very grim. “Let's get him to the house for now, and I'll have Gerald find Astrid.”

They grabbed the corners and sides of the blanket and, on the count of three, lifted with sounds of effort.

“Haakan might be getting older, but he is still a mighty big man,” Pastor Solberg grunted out. They had to stop and set their burden down once to catch their breaths, but as they heaved him up again, Lars ran into the yard.

“Let me help.” He grabbed a corner, and they carried their
burden up the stairs to the porch. Ingeborg released her grip on the blanket to hold the screen door open. Then she ran ahead to pull the covers back on the bed.

“Just lay him, blanket and all, right here.”

“Kaaren called the doctors.”

“Good.”

As Pastor Solberg started untying Haakan's boots, Ingeborg yanked open her black bag. She unbuttoned his shirt and laid the stethoscope against his chest. His heartbeat was fast but steady. She lifted an eyelid but could see nothing amiss there. He was breathing heavily, but he was not responding. She felt his head and neck for any swelling, but other than some rigidity in his jaw, nothing.