Unto a Good Land (49 page)

No! No! He must defend himself, he must tell Father the truth: It was because of the children he had emigrated—above all for their sake. He had brought his wife and three children with him, but he had also brought with him a pair of worn-out little shoes that had belonged to a fourth child. Didn’t Father remember Anna? She died. She was hungry too long. Of her he had only the little shoes left, and he had taken them with him from Korpamoen; they would always remind him of his child, they would make him remember the hunger that snatched her away from him. Father must know, he must remember: the famine year, the famine bread, the poor beggars, all those who starved to death? If not, he would show Father Anna’s shoes. They are here in the sack! I put them into the sack. There isn’t another thing in the sack. . . .

When he lost his little girl he had been in despair. Father must remember how he had searched for knot-free boards for the coffin. It was lowered into the earth, but her shoes were left. At times he picks them up, holds them in his hands: her small feet have been in them, her little feet have romped about in them, she has taken many steps in them, up and down, a thousand times. Anna’s feet. . . .
Father, it hurts to die. Don’t let God come and take me! I want to stay here with you. . . .
No, it mustn’t happen again, it mustn’t happen to his other children, he must take them away from the tormenting hunger—out here. And now he is here with his sack; and it has grown heavier and heavier, until he has fallen with it. He is crawling on his knees in the snow, with the burden on his back. But it’s burning hot in the snow, it smarts, smarts. . . .

And his own father is also here in America—he hasn’t written a letter, although he learned to write while sitting inside as a cripple. He has come here himself and speaks severe words to his eldest son: “I warned you, your mother warned you, friends and neighbors warned you. But you had to do it. You were self-willed, stubborn, listened to no one. Therefore things went as they did; now you lie here. . . . You dragged away my children, my grandchildren. Where are your own children? Where do you keep them? Have you taken care of them? Have you found them yet? Do you remember the place where you buried them in the snow? Be careful of your nose in this cold!”

Father will buy flour, Mother will bake bread. . . . Where is the bread? . . . It’s
my
son! But you are my son. And things have come to pass as you wanted them to. Karl Oskar, are you looking for bread on your own table? You’re as stubborn as your nose is long. You couldn’t rest until you got to North America. You wanted to get here to fetch that sack of flour, to wander about with the sack. . . . It wasn’t much to travel so far for—not much for one who wanted to improve things for himself. . . . But I told you it was a long way to travel, that you never would find your way, wouldn’t be able to carry it all the distance, it’s too heavy . . . and what a cold night! Not even a beggar would be out in this weather. . . .

I’ll succeed! I’ll improve myself! And Karl Oskar swings the sack onto his back again and waves good-by to his father and mother, who stand on the stoop looking after him. He walks lightly with his burden, through the narrow gate, onto the road, and then he looks back: Father and Mother stand there. He calls to them but they do not answer. They remain standing on the stoop, deaf, dumb, lame. Never more in his life will they move. They will remain standing there for ever, looking after him, the son who walked out through the gate, who emigrated. For all time they will stand there; they do not hear when he calls, but he must tell them, he must call louder: “It wasn’t because I was stubborn and wouldn’t listen to you, nor was I dissatisfied. That you must remember! I didn’t emigrate because of this, do you hear me, Father and Mother?
I didn’t want to make any more coffins.
No coffins for my little ones. Remember that! That was why I emigrated.”

But Father and Mother do not listen, they do not hear. And they cannot move. They are only wooden images, put up by the Indians. The red eyes staring at him aren’t human eyes; the Indians have put animal heads on Father’s and Mother’s bodies! They have cut off the heads of his parents and have replaced them with wolf heads! That’s why they stand immobile without hearing him when he shouts at them: “Can you hear me?”

He shouts and yells, he has to, he can no longer endure the intense smarting from the fire, he shrieks as he lies there among the scorching firebrands of the bitter-cold snow. . . .

—5—

Karl Oskar Nilsson sat up and felt his face with his hand: Where was he? Was he at home with his father, defending his emigration? Or had his father come here? Was he in two countries at the same time? Wasn’t he walking homeward with a—
the sack
!

His befuddled mind cleared: He had gone to sleep on his sack in the snow. But the cold had bitten him badly, and he had shouted himself awake. He jumped to his feet, violently, as if attacked by a swarm of hornets; he was like a madman—he jumped about, kicking, stamping the ground. He flailed his arms, slapped his hands and face, beat his body with his fists. For several minutes he pummeled himself—and his blood pumped faster, his body heat was returning.

He must have dozed off for a little while; he might never have awakened! How could he have lain down this bitterly cold night? How could he have forgotten to guard against the treacherous temptation of rest?

He could not have been asleep long, yet he had had time to dream evil dreams, listen to many voices; they had told him things he probably had thought to himself, when alone; and all the while he had felt the smarting cold, burning his skin like firebrands. Thank God, he had not lost sensation—he was not frostbitten yet. But a few moments more, in that hole in the snow. . . . The ice-cold shroud of frost-death was down there—it would soon have soothed his pains, would soon have made him slumber forever!

But he was still alive. He loosened his stiff joints, he forced his body to move again. And once more he swung the flour sack onto his back. Fury boiled within him as he made ready to carry it farther; he gained strength from his seething anger, from adversity’s bitterness. Many times before he had enjoyed the gift of strength from vexation, and this time it was more welcome than ever. Who said he wasn’t able? Those spiteful neighbors in Sweden, how they would enjoy his misfortunes if they knew! He could just hear them say: Karl Oskar couldn’t succeed! What did we tell you?

He was enraged. In a wild frenzy he began to kick the big stump that had tripped him. His feet felt like icicles in his boots. But suddenly he stopped and stood still: Who could have felled a great tree here in the wilderness? The stump was fresh and cut by an ax!

He dropped his sack, bent down, brushed away the snow and examined the stump carefully. It was a low stump, not cut by a straight-standing American. This stump was cut by a Swede! He recognized the stump—
he had felled this tree himself.
It was the great oak he had cut down here, their food table! And that oak had grown on a knoll close behind their house—only a few hundred yards from home. . . .

Now he would find his way; he was practically there.

But Karl Oskar walked the remaining distance slowly. He was exhausted; and he must have carried the sack much farther than fifteen miles, for he was approaching his house from the wrong direction! He could see the yellow light from a window greeting him between the trunks of the sugar maples. There stood his house, a fire burning on the hearth. With infinite slowness he dragged his feet the last steps. The sack’s weight had increased again, this last stretch.

In a low voice Karl Oskar called Kristina’s name. He heard her pull the bolt on the inside of the door. With great effort he managed to lift his feet over the high threshold and dump the sack onto the floor. He put down his burden for the last time, with a dull thud. And then he slumped down on a stump chair near the fire, limp, jointless, weak; he dropped a full sack on the floor and sank into the chair like a discarded, empty sack.

“You’re late,” said Kristina. “I’ve been worried about you.”

“It was a long way.”

“I guess so. And cold tonight. Did it bother you?”

“A little. The last stretch.”

“You should have taken your other coat.”

“But it was so mild when I left.”

He was thawing out near the fire. He wondered how his feet had fared—perhaps his toes were frostbitten. He must go out and get a shovelful of snow, then he would melt some fat and rub his limbs, first with snow, then with fat.

Kristina had already opened the sack. She dipped into it for some flour which she strained between her fingers: “Good rye flour! You must have almost three bushels.”

“Thereabouts, I guess.”

“You had enough to carry!”

“About right for me.”

“Now we’ll have bread till spring. And we’ve been promised potatoes.”

She related how Danjel had come to visit today and offered to lend them a bushel of potatoes, Jonas Petter too had promised them a bushel; they could pay back in the fall when they harvested their own.

“That’s well,” Karl Oskar said. “They are kind.”

“It’s hardest for us,” Kristina said. “We’re the poorest. Danjel wondered if we would survive the winter.”

“We shall manage!”

Karl Oskar had taken off his boots and socks and sat with his bare feet near the fire: his toes itched and burned, feeling was returning. There was a spell of silence, and he thought: It could have happened that the next letter to reach Ljuder Parish, probably written by Danjel, would have said Karl Oskar Nilsson from Korpamoen had frozen to death in the forest a short distance from his house. One cold night February last. His body was found on a sack of flour which he had carried on his back from the store, many Swedish miles away. The exhausted man hadn’t been able to reach home, he had lain down to rest in the severe cold, on his sack, had fallen asleep, and had never awakened.

But this piece of news would not reach Sweden now. It would not gladden those hearts who had predicted ill for him out here. What had happened to him this winter night in the wilderness would not happen again. Bread was necessary for life, but one mustn’t give life to get it.

Kristina was putting food on the table for her husband; she would set the dough before they went to bed and she would get up early to heat the oven. . . .

Johan awakened in his bed in the corner; he yelled with delight as he saw his father sitting at the hearth: “Father is back!”

He jumped out of bed and ran to sit on Karl Oskar’s knee: “Father has brought flour! Mother can bake bread!”

Karl Oskar sat silent, stroking his son’s head clumsily with his frost-stiff fingers.

“You must be hungry, Karl Oskar,” Kristina said. “It’s all ready for you.”

He sat down to his supper, and he ate quietly but he was satisfied in his silence; tomorrow the missing loaf of bread would again be in its place on their table.

XXIII

THE LETTER FROM SWEDEN

—1—

This was the longest of all winters for the settlers; they counted the days and waited for spring.

March had his cap full of snow, shaking it over the earth in a final blizzard. But after the snowstorm came mild weather with a south wind blowing day after day. The snow carpet thinned, the lake ice soon lay blueish bare. The night frost was still with them, but the sun warmed the air in daytime; no longer need they keep the hearth fire alive through the night.

One day Johan came rushing in from the meadow, calling out loudly before he reached the threshold. What had happened? In his hand the boy held a little flower, pulled up by its roots.

“Look Mother! A
sippa
! I’ve found a spring
sippa
!”

He had found the flower near the brook. All in the cabin crowded around to see it. It was a spindly little flower, hardly three inches tall, with liver-brown leaves and a blue crown on a thin stem. Below the crown was a circle of heart-shaped green leaves. It must be a
sippa,
but it was the smallest one any of them had ever seen. Kristina said the Swedish
sippa
had a wider crown, and this flower had no smell. Karl Oskar and Robert could not remember how it was with the
sippas
at home in that respect, but she insisted they had a fragrance: all flowers in the homeland were fragrant.

However small the flower was, it must be a
sippa.
In both Sweden and America the hepatica was the first flower to appear in spring, and this was a singular discovery for the settlers. The flower grew near a brook in Minnesota, just as in Småland. In some way it seemed to link the two countries, to bring home closer.

Kristina filled a cracked coffee cup with water and put the little bloom on the window ledge: the first message of spring had come to them.

Once more March shook his cap, but this time it was a wet snowfall, soon turning into heavy rain. For a few days the earth was washed with melting snow. The calls of water birds were heard from the lake: this was the second spring message.

The ground was bare, but ice still covered the St. Croix River. Robert went about in a dream, waiting. During the nights he lay awake in his bed, listening to the changing sounds in his left ear. He could hear one sound that impatiently called him away from here, he could hear the muffled roar of a mighty water which as yet ran under the winter’s icy roof but soon would burst into open daylight and swell in its spring flow; it would bring a vessel with eagle feathers on the bow, a ship to carry him away. Soon he would travel downstream on that great water which was forever wandering on to the sea: Robert was waiting for the
Red Wing
of St. Louis.

Karl Oskar and Kristina were waiting for the same boat: they were waiting for a letter from Sweden.

A year would soon have passed since they had left the homeland, and as yet they had not heard one word from their parents and families.

Karl Oskar had written a letter to Sweden last summer, and another last fall, and now in spring they waited for an answer. During the fall Robert had written a letter for Kristina to her parents in Duvemåla, and she was now waiting for an answer. When she had learned to read in school, she ought to have asked to be instructed in writing also, then she could now have written herself to her relatives and friends at home. But her father had been of the opinion that a female could make no use of the art of writing—it was always the menfolk who drew up sales contracts, wrote auction records and other important papers. She now deeply regretted having let her father decide for her. But how could she know when going to school as a little girl what she must go through in life? How could she then have imagined that one day she would emigrate to North America? At that time she didn’t even know this land existed! It was only two years ago that she had first heard the name North America.

Karl Oskar was helping Jonas Petter cut fence rails, in order to earn a few dollars to enable him to buy food supplies from Mr. Abbott’s store in Taylors Falls. He also helped his neighbors to break in their newly bought oxen, and to build a wagon of wood with oak trundles for wheels, a replica of Anders Månsson’s ox wagon. Having no team, Karl Oskar needed no wagon, but by helping his neighbors he gathered knowledge that would be useful when he made his own.

Danjel’s first journey with his new team and wagon was when he drove Ulrika and her daughter to Stillwater, where Elin was to seek work. He drove on a new road which the lumber company had cleared through the forest during the past winter. Ulrika returned to the settlement without her daughter, and a few days later she walked to Ki-Chi-Saga and related to Kristina what had taken place on their journey to Stillwater.

Elin had remained in town as maid to an upper-class American family. Pastor Jackson had found her a position with one of the richest men in his congregation, a high lord who ruled the lumber company. Elin was to receive eight dollars a month besides food and lodging, and all she had to do was wash dishes, scrub floors, and do laundry. She would not be called on to do a single outside chore, not even carry in water and wood. This was quite different from Sweden, where the maids had to do the menfolk’s chores as well, and were paid one daler a month. Here not even half as much work was required—yet her wages were twenty times as high! For eight dollars made about twenty daler.

Ulrika praised God Who had helped her and her daughter to America, and next to the Lord she praised Pastor Jackson who had negotiated the position for Elin.

On this visit Ulrika had been able to speak with Pastor Jackson. She had understood about half of the words he said, and he had understood a little more than half of her words. For the rest they had guessed, and nearly always guessed right. The Glad One was quick-witted and learned easily, she had picked up so many English expressions that Kristina was surprised. She herself had learned hardly a single word yet.

But Ulrika was bold and resourceful, she talked to every American she met. She was often spoken to by American menfolk who—as menfolk will—let their eyes rest on an attractive woman. In this way she had opportunity to practice the foreign tongue. Because of her shapely body she learned English faster than women who were spoken to less often. She told Kristina she was already dreaming in English, and in her dreams men spoke whole long sentences in English to her. But it still happened that she dreamed wrong about some words.

Jonas Petter had gossiped that unmarried Ulrika of Västergöhl had a new suitor, Samuel Nöjd, the fur trader from Dalcarlia. Kristina now asked if the gossip were true.

“Yes. Nöjd has proposed.”

“He too! And you have answered him?”

“He got the same answer as Månsson. And the same comfort!”

Ulrika explained: She was just, she treated all her suitors alike. Here in America all people should be treated alike since there weren’t four classes of people as there were in Sweden, but only one class, a human class. Samuel Nöjd had offered her a home in St. Paul, where he intended to open a store for meat—sausages, hams, steaks, and such. He was going to give up his fur trapping. But she had never liked the Dalcarlian, nothing was ever right for him, he complained wherever he lived, complained of the food and houses and people. That was why she had given a new name to the pelt hunter; in Swedish his name meant Samuel Satisfied,
she
called him Samuel Mis-Nöjd, Samuel Dissatisfied. If she married him, he would soon be dissatisfied and complain of her too. Nor did she think he was a desirable man for bed play. He acted like a man, but he liked to live in dirt, he didn’t keep himself clean, he stank at a yard’s distance. He stank of old slaughter, he smelled of fat, blood, and entrails. All his work had to do with slaughter, skinning animals, tanning their hides. She wouldn’t mind working in his store in St. Paul—she had heard two thousand people lived in that city—and she would willingly sell his meat and sausage and ham at great profit. But she would not in her marriage bed have a husband who stank like an entrail slinger.

No, she would never become Mrs. Samuel Nöjd, she had thanked him and said no to the offer.

“I wonder who your next suitor will be,” said Kristina.

“I’ve had one since Nöjd,” Ulrika reported. “That Norwegian in Stillwater made a try for me.”

Thomassen, the little Norwegian shoemaker whom they had met last summer, had dropped in at Pastor Jackson’s last time she was there. He had asked if she were married, the man obviously meant business. Ulrika had never seen so lustful a man, he was so hot he had to walk stooped over. But he was such a little man, so spindly, she might have trouble finding him in bed. And before he had time to propose she had made it clear to him that she had no desire to become a shoemaker’s wife in Stillwater. If she were to marry any man outside her own countrymen, then he must be an American. There were not many Swedes to choose from in Minnesota, nearly all the unmarried ones had already proposed to her, so she guessed she would be forced to marry an American.

Jonas Petter had said to Kristina that Ulrika of Västergöhl was now the most sought-after woman in the whole St. Croix Valley. And Kristina answered that this was not surprising: Every unmarried man was looking for a wife, and Ulrika had the fortune to be shaped in such a way that she attracted and tempted menfolk. She was good-looking, still young, and looked younger than she was; she had a healthy, blooming appearance, and since arriving in America she had blossomed out in both soul and body. She was capable in all she did, she cooked good food, she was companionable, always in good temper and high spirits. No one had ever seen the Glad One weep. Those who knew her well could not imagine her shedding tears. Who wouldn’t wish such a wife?

Jonas Petter predicted Ulrika would be married before full summer.

Kristina said to Ulrika: “I wonder who will finally get you?”

“I myself don’t bother to wonder,” replied Ulrika, full of confidence. “I leave everything to the Lord’s decision.”

—2—

Before Elin went to Stillwater and accepted her position with the high American family, she and Robert had studied a chapter from his language book: “Advice for Swedish servant-folk in America.” She must learn to understand the commands of the mistress, otherwise she would perform her duties wrongly and be driven from service the very first day. Together they read the most important sentences concerning her duties, they read them in English, over and over, until the servant-girl-to-be knew them by heart. The instructions began with the first day and went on for the whole week:

Good morning, Missus! I am the new servant girl.—Welcome, change clothes and feel at home!—What time am I expected down in the morning?—You must get up at six o’clock. Clean out the ashes in the stove. Hand me the pot. I’ll show you how to make oatmeal. Empty the slop bucket and tidy the maid’s room. Eat your own breakfast. Leave no food on the dining-room table while you sweep and dust. Wash dishes and pots. Tomorrow is washday. Everything must be ironed Tuesday morning. After dinner on Sunday you may go to church. You must be back at half past nine. Wednesday you must clean upstairs. Now eat your own dinner. . . .

They went through the whole week of a maid in an upper-class American family.

By now Elin had learned to move her lips less, and she kept her tongue far back in her mouth while speaking English. She had improved greatly since her mother had been teaching her what she picked up in her conversations with American menfolk.

When Elin had served as nursemaid at home in Ljuder, the master had held morning prayers for all the maids and farm help every day. Each one had been required to repeat by heart the verses in the Catechism from Titus, Second Chapter, before they were allowed to eat breakfast: “Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again; not purloining, but shewing all fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.”

Elin thought as an American maid she would now be required to read these verses and she wanted to learn them in English. But Robert told her: The Americans did not require their servants to obey the Catechism. Moreover, no one out here had to obey the authorities, who weren’t put in their place by God. She herself could see from the book that servants were treated justly in America. The master and mistress bade them welcome! They asked servants to feel at home and gave them time off to go to church! Nay, the mistress was even so noble that she told her maid to eat! Both breakfast and dinner! Had anyone in Sweden ever heard a master or a mistress ask a servant to eat?

When Elin accepted the position in Stillwater, Robert stayed at home and waited. He waited for a secret message Elin had promised to send him. And one Saturday, the third week in March, it came: The ice had broken up on the St. Croix River, and in Stillwater they were looking for the first steamer.

The next day, Sunday, Robert walked to Danjel’s and spoke to Arvid. They were ready, they had long been ready, they had been waiting. And when Robert came home in the evening he announced to Karl Oskar: “Tomorrow morning Arvid and I shall walk to Stillwater. We’re taking the steamboat.”

“The steamboat?”