A Measure of Mercy (29 page)

“What do we have to dress her in? Other than blankets for now.” A shiver rocked the little one, her ribs showing through the dark skin. “Good. She is responding. Put the towels on the oven door. Oh, my word. I need to get the biscuits out. They’re probably burned to bits.”

Haakan grabbed a dish towel, folded it, and opened the oven door to grab the pan of well-browned biscuits. “They’ll be edible.”

“Leave the door open. We can wrap her in the towels now, then in a quilt, and I’ll sit here and hold her in the heat.” When they finished, Ingeborg rocked the chair gently, cuddling the little girl all wrapped up like a baby in the quilt.

“I’m going back out to help finish milking.”

“All right.” She heard a mewling like a kitten’s cry from the child in her arms. “Hear that?” Pulling back the quilt she watched as the girl’s eyelashes fluttered. Another shiver rocked her, and her eyes flew open. She stared up at Ingeborg without moving, as if frozen indeed.

“It’s all right, little one,” she crooned softly. “You’re all right. You’re safe here.”

The black eyes stared back at her, not moving, not blinking until another shiver wracked the little body.

“How did you get here? Where are you from? Who brought you?” The questions poured forth in the same mother croon Ingeborg had used with her own children and grandchildren and any other small children who needed her. She held the girl close, trying to give her all the body heat possible. Her own face wore the heat from the stove like sunburn, but she stayed in the gently rocking chair until the little girl’s eyes drifted closed and she sighed to sleep.

Haakan found them in the same place. He stoked the fires before taking off his boots and sliding his feet back into his moccasins. “Andrew says he barely made it over. I told him he was nuts to try. We can’t string a line that far, but we can handle the fifteen milking cows without him. Good thing we put the posts clear to Lars’s. Although he said he could see plenty clear enough this morning, I think we should wait until daylight before milking during these winter months.”

“The child was awake some. She still shivers once in a while but seems to be sleeping peacefully.”

“What did she do?”

“Just stared at me like a wild animal that freezes so as not to be seen.”

“That might well describe her. What will we do with her? Notify the Indian agent?”

“Why? We have plenty of room. She can stay here until someone comes for her.”

“They probably think she died in the blizzard.”

“No. For some reason I feel certain someone brought her to our barn.”

“Well, why not to the house, then?”

“Afraid? Thought we might turn them away?”

“Aw, Inge, have we ever turned anyone away?” He set the skillet on the stove and retrieved the sliced ham from the table, where Ingeborg had started breakfast. With the ham sizzling, he fetched the eggs from the pantry.

“If you hold her, I’ll make the breakfast.”

“You hold her. I’ll make the breakfast. If she sees another strange face, she might be frightened to pieces. Have you tried the telephone yet?”

She shook her head. “But no one has called either.”

“I’m thinking the lines might be down. The blow last night was enough to take them down even without the ice on the wires.”

He walked over to the box on the wall and lifted the receiver. Even after he spun the crank on the side, nothing happened. “Hello? Hello?” He hung it back up. “Out between here and town at least. Who knows about the rest.”

“You going to make gravy?”

“I think I draw the line at gravy. Ham and eggs are plenty fine. Looks like we need to scrape the bottoms a bit on those biscuits.” He cracked four eggs into the popping grease and used the turner to splash the ham juice on them.

“You do that like you cook every day.”

“I learned a long time ago.”

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“Why mess up a good thing?” He grinned at her. “You want to eat at the table or in that chair?” He took the plates down from the warming shelf, slid the eggs and ham onto them, and headed for the table.

Ingeborg leaned her head against the back of the rocker.
Lord, you
sure know how to throw a curve into my day. Again I know you have a
plan. Thanks for letting us be a part of that plan.

Haakan came over and held out his arms. She put the sleeping child in his strong arms, stood, and leaned into them both. A child in their house. Only a visitor most likely but a child to love nonetheless. “Let’s eat. If she wakes up, I’m sure she’d like something too.” By the look of the little body, she needed a lot of good food. Were the rest of her people in such bad shape as she was?

23

J
oshua stared out of the boardinghouse window at the heavily falling snow. There’d be no more well drilling for a while, and he could only imagine how deep the snow would be in his cellar before this quit. He blew out a sigh and shook his head. Here he’d been hoping to get the basement finished and the house framed in before the snow so he could work inside in the winter.

So much for good ideas. So much for earning enough money to pay off his lot. He shook his head and made his way downstairs to the dining room. At least he had food and a good roof over his head. What if they’d been on their way to do another well and windmill?

“Sure is nasty out there,” Miss Christopherson said when he sat down at his table.

“How did Mrs. Sam get here to cook?”

“Well, we all spent the night here. That’s what we do when it starts to blow from the north, although this is early for a storm like this. Do you want oatmeal first or bacon, eggs, and fried cornmeal mush?”

“I’ll pass on the oatmeal this morning, thank you.”

“Coffee coming right up.”

“Is that cinnamon rolls I smell?”

“Sure is. I’ll bring you one with the coffee.”

As she hurried to the kitchen, he looked around at the few others gathered in the dining room. A family that looked like they were planning on heading west. He wondered why they had gotten off the train in Blessing. There wasn’t any land around here for either buying or homesteading. The Bjorklunds and Knutsons bought up whatever came available. Two well-dressed men sat at another table. They obviously knew each other. Railroad men perhaps? Sure looked like businessmen. A drummer sat over against the wall. How many would still be here after the westbound train came through?

He ate his breakfast and returned to his room to stare at the snow-blinded window.

How long since he’d had a day with absolutely nothing to do? He mentally made a list. He could write to Avis. She would be pleased to hear from him. He could write to Astrid. Or he could write to Frank and see if there was any way to make things right there. Not that he wanted to, but Pastor Solberg’s sermon series on forgiveness kept eating away at him.

If the snow let up he would go down to the smithy and see if there weren’t enough parts to put together another windmill head. A draft sneaked under the window, nearly freezing his midsection. He slammed his fist on the top of the lower frame in the hopes of driving it tighter into the frame. It slipped some, and he cranked the latch closed. That helped, and he could roll up a towel or something to block the remaining draft.

Restless and feeling confined in his room, he took his writing kit and headed downstairs to the gathering room, where a fire roared in the fireplace and gas lamps cast a cheerful glow against the dim light coming from outside. Sitting in a chair at a table, he laid his supplies out and started with the letter to his sister. That would be the easiest.

He told her about his job, playing his guitar for dances and church. He knew she would be appalled at the guitar in church. Back in Iowa only organ or piano music was proper for worship. He told her about digging the basement for his house and that the blizzard was filling it in far more quickly than he’d dug it. He closed with a question.

I am thinking of coming back for Christmas. Do you think I will be welcome there? Or have Father and my brothers pretty much washed their hands of me? It all depends on the weather, of course, if we can finish the cellar and frame the house. Depends on if winter is really here or we will have another warmer spell for a time.

Please write. I miss you and I know you miss Mother. I am still in shock I think, almost pretending she will be waiting and glad to see me when I get there.

Your brother,
Joshua

Addressing the envelope, he overheard the two men talking. He realized they must be land speculators, buying land up in the West and then selling it again to those who wanted to still get in on cheap land. He knew that no matter what the monetary price of the land, it would cost them far more in sweat and heartache. He’d seen others already giving up and heading back East. He’d been one. What would life have been like if he had stuck it out here? There wouldn’t have been the showdown between him and his brother. He should have been smarter, that was all. His father had planned for Frank to have the farm all along, just stringing him along to get as much work out of him as possible. He’d never planned on paying for that labor.

When Joshua realized his teeth were clamped and his fists clenched, he shook his head. Good thing he had put the remaining money from selling his land south of Blessing in the bank in Iowa so that he’d had some cash to bring north with him again. This time he would build a decent house, not even think about farming, and concentrate on building windmills and digging wells, something he enjoyed doing. When they released the gears and let the windmill spin for the first time, he felt like whooping himself. One more family had a well and a windmill to bring up the water. Seeing the water gush from a pipe into a stock tank or down a pipe to the house pleased him greatly. One woman cried when she used the hand pump to bring water into her sink for the first time.

There was something beautiful about seeing windmills silhouetted against a sunset or sunrise. It said there were people there who cared about the land and the life.

He took out another piece of paper but paused before writing when Miss Christopherson announced that coffee and cinnamon rolls were set out in the dining room if anyone was interested.

He was. He stopped at a window in the dining room but couldn’t even see across the street. The wind was picking up again. Those two years in his shanty he’d nearly lost his mind when the blizzard closed him in like this. He’d strung a rope to the barn so he could care for his cows and horses, but the tar paper shack had been nearly useless for keeping the cold out. He got frostbite sitting right next to the stove. He’d finally glued newspapers to the walls to help insulate it.

“The westbound train will be in the station in fifteen minutes,” Miss Christopherson announced a few minutes later. Sure enough, the two businessmen and the family all gathered their things and made their way to the door. “You just follow the fence, keeping close by it, and you cannot miss the station. You can get lost in the middle of the street if you don’t.” She bid them good-bye and Godspeed and pushed against the door with her shoulder to shut out the screaming wind demanding entrance.

“You think it is letting up any?” Joshua asked when she returned, brushing snow off her apron.

She shook her head. “Not at all. Can I get you more coffee?”

With two letters to leave in the box for the mail, he returned to his room after dinner and picked up his guitar. Here he’d been thinking there was no time to practice, and now with the storm blowing Joshua had plenty of time. He’d best be making good use of it. He was still trying to get the chording right on “The Old Rugged Cross” when he heard a knock on the door. After setting the guitar on the bed, he crossed the room to open the door.

Miss Christopherson had raised her hand to knock again but dropped it to her side. “I have a favor to ask.”

He nodded. “Was I bothering anyone?”

“On the contrary. We were all wondering if you would be willing to play down in the kitchen so we don’t have to sit in the dining room to hear.”

The earnest look on her slender face made him smile. “I don’t want to bother anyone.”

“Oh, no bother. We could do some singing while we make supper. If you please, of course.” She paused a moment. “I’m sure we could find a couple of cinnamon rolls to make it worth your while.”

Joshua chuckled and shrugged. “Of course I can play down there, and it would probably be warmer than here too. I’ll be right down.”

“Thank you.”

He picked up his guitar, a couple of picks, and what little sheet music he had, and made his way down the stairs, a rosy warm feeling clinging to his chest. He played while the staff cooked and laughed and sang along. Several other patrons drifted in, and what started out to be a dreary day turned into a party. Mrs. Sam taught him a couple of new songs that she said came from her people when still in slavery. As she sang them he fingered the chords, writing them down at the end so he wouldn’t forget.

“How come you don’t come to the dances,” he asked during one of the eating times.

“I’m always either fixing food or cleaning up. Just don’t work out, that’s all.”