A Measure of Mercy (30 page)

And that was why they were never in church either, he surmised. “A voice like yours needs to be heard more.”

Mrs. Sam rolled her eyes. “Pretty words don’t cut no nevermind wit me.”

But he noticed that she pushed an extra roll his way.

“WE HAVE TO have a name for her,” Ingeborg said that evening.

Haakan glanced up from the table, where he sat with his Bible open and the kerosene lamp close enough to make reading easier. “She’s slept all day?”

Ingeborg nodded. “I woke her to feed her some soup, and after eating what I fed her, she fell right back to sleep. Without ever saying a word.”

“Perhaps she cannot hear.”

“No, she can hear. The cat mewed, and she looked over to the stove.”

“We can most likely get to town tomorrow, and I’ll ask around, see if anyone has seen any Indians passing through.”

“I keep thinking about Metiz and wishing she were here to help me.” She pulled the coffeepot forward to the hot part of the stove.

“Some days I still miss her so much the tears come. Metiz, and Agnes.

I remind myself how blessed I am to have had two such wonderful friends, and I am grateful, but . . .” She huffed a sigh. “You want some coffee?”

“Do I ever turn down a cup of coffee? And perhaps some of that rhubarb sauce with a bit of cream?”

“I s’pose you’d like cookies with that too?”

“If that’s not too much bother.” His eyes twinkled in the lamplight.

“And all because I wanted a cup of coffee.” She fetched the canned sauce from the pantry and the cream from the icebox she’d moved into the pantry by the window, where it was cold enough to not need ice. For years they had stored cream and eggs and things that spoiled in the screened box off the window and let Mother Nature keep things cold enough. During the winter, they didn’t even need the outer box. The closed-off pantry sufficed.

“Chocolate or gingerbread?”

“Both.”

Ingeborg chuckled as she dished up their rhubarb sauce and cookies. Haakan did like his cookies . . . well, all desserts. She turned from the counter to see two black eyes staring at her from the pallet by the stove. She smiled and nodded, but the child ducked her head. Putting extra cookies on the plate, Ingeborg carried the things to the table. “She’s awake,” she whispered.

Haakan turned to look and gave his wife a questioning glance. Ingeborg returned to the stove and carried the coffeepot to the table to fill their cups. She picked up a cookie and brought it with her to set the coffeepot back. Then kneeling at the pallet, she held out the cookie.

The child’s nostrils flared at the fragrance, much like a wild animal checking the wind.

“Here, this is for you.” Ingeborg held it closer.

The little girl stared from the cookie to Ingeborg and back again before tentatively reaching for the goodie. She sniffed it, and then stuffed it into her mouth as if fearing it would be taken away.

“Well, that worked.” Ingeborg brought two the next time, and the same thing happened, only now without the waiting.

“You better not give her any more,” Haakan said softly. “It might make her sick. Too rich.”

“True.” Ingeborg rose and returned to the pantry, bringing back a jar of milk this time. She poured half a cup and took that over. It disappeared as readily as the cookies. “Well, she knows how to drink from a cup.”

“I’m sure they have cups and plates or something similar on the reservation by now.” His teasing tone made her smile back.

“Metiz said they used to drink out of tanned hides or a horn, sometimes vessels carved of wood.” She looked down at her moccasins, made so long ago with such love and care by Metiz. “I wonder if the school that was started on the reservation is still going. Or if they have any medical help.”

There had been talk of combining the small reservation to the north of Blessing with some others in western North Dakota, but nothing had come of that. While the churchwomen sent a barrel of quilts and used clothing to the reservation once a year, they’d not maintained close ties. Metiz had come south from the Winnipeg area, where there was a gathering of Sioux French-Canadian families—not really a tribe but a settlement.

How would they communicate with this child? Ingeborg dipped her cookie into her coffee cup, aware of the black eyes that watched her every move.

“You suppose she needs to use the pot?” Haakan, ever practical, asked.

“What do her people do?”

“Probably just step outside the tepee, or whatever, and squat.”

Ingeborg nodded. “Lesson one, then. Goodness, think how long it has been since I potty trained a child.”

“I say we bring Inga out here for a couple of days, and she’ll take care of all kinds of training. You know how she loves to boss Carl around.”

“That’s not a bad idea.”

“It’s a good idea. I thought of it.”

“But what if this little girl doesn’t speak English?”

Haakan thought a moment. “I’ll lay money on Inga.”

Ingeborg cleared off their coffee things and extended her hand to the child. Black eyes stared up at her, but finally the girl stood and reached out with her own hand. Together they walked to the rocker, where Ingeborg sat down and tugged gently on the small hand. “Come sit with me.” She patted her knees and held out both hands.

After hanging back for a bit, the little one stepped close to her knees and allowed Ingeborg to help her up into her lap.

“See, that didn’t hurt at all. You can be comfortable here with me, and we’ll rock a bit and maybe sing some songs.”

The girl grabbed the arm of the chair when Ingeborg first set it to rocking gently, but soon she relaxed and a smile touched her face at the pleasant motion. Slowly she sank against Ingeborg’s chest and heaved a big sigh.

Ingeborg matched the sigh. The stink from the black hair made her wish she had washed her, but at the time, getting her warm was about all she could do. She started humming and moved into singing “Jesus Loves Me.” Following that with other songs, she let her mind wander ahead.
Lord, you knew she was coming to us, and now please
let me know what I am supposed to do. Take her to the reservation? Keep
her here in the hopes that someone will come for her? I know to do one
thing, to love her. Somewhere her mother can’t or is gone. Has she other
family? How do we get her to talk?

She felt the thin little body relax against her and her breathing even out. The most important thing was to keep her from any ill effects of her near to freezing.

“Where will she sleep?”

“I’m thinking of a pallet beside our bed. Do you think she would be warm enough there? Or she can sleep with us. What will Freda say when she comes back to see we have another guest?”

“I think Freda will be just like you, delighted to have a child to fuss over.”

“I’m that obvious, eh?”

Haakan just smiled. “Well, for one thing, I hope you can get her bathed and her hair washed tomorrow. I’d forgotten the Indian smells of bear grease and smoke and who knows what else.”

“I’m going to ask Kaaren if she has any clothes over there that might fit her. Your undershirt will do for tonight. Do I scrub her deerskin clothes like I do cloth?”

“Did Metiz scrub her things?”

“She did her wool and cotton things. How do we keep the deerskin from getting stiff if I wash it?” So many questions. Haakan took the sleeping child and laid her on the pallet by the stove so Ingeborg could stand. She let the cat out and retrieved bedding from the trunk at the foot of their bed.

Haakan banked the stoves while she folded a feather bed in half and laid it on the floor by the bed, then added folded sheets and quilts. She laid one blanket over the back of a chair by the stove.

When they were ready for bed, she wrapped the warm blanket around the little one and laid her in the middle of the well-padded pallet, tucking the quilts around her. Since her hair felt damp, Ingeborg brought a knit wool cap from the box by the door and put it over her head.

“There. Dear Lord, let her sleep peacefully, and keep those who brought her to us safe.”

“Amen,” Haakan said as he lifted the covers for Ingeborg to crawl under.

“We could put her in Astrid’s room after Freda comes back. That way there would be someone upstairs with her.”

“Very true. Good night, my Inge.”

Sometime during the night, Ingeborg felt a little hand lifting the covers, and the girl crawled in bed with them, snuggling against her back without a sound.

Was trust built so easily? A couple of cookies, a warm place, and a lap complete with rocking chair?

24

W
hen Ingeborg awoke before daylight, she picked up the sleeping child and nestled her back on her own pallet before heading for the kitchen to wake the fire in the stove. With the clatter of lids and the scrunch and thunk of wood, all morning sounds to her ears, she didn’t hear the patter of two little feet and turned to see the little body, clothed in a droopy undershirt, climbing up into the rocker. The girl settled herself and leaned forward to get the chair moving, then stared at Ingeborg with a tentative smile.

“Well, good morning to you too.” Ingeborg held out her hand. “Come, I’ll show you the pot. You must be in misery by now.”

The smile disappeared, and she ducked her head, at the same time sliding forward off the chair seat. When Ingeborg showed her the enameled pot behind the dressing screen, the child hoisted the shirt and sat down like she’d been doing so all her life. When she finished, she hopped up and looked at Ingeborg, who nodded and smiled.

Back in the kitchen, she found her clothes in a pile in the corner and sat down to pull on the leggings.

“No.” Ingeborg shook her head. “They are wet and dirty.” She held out her hand again and brought her back to the chair, leaving the clothing behind. The child glared up at her but climbed up in the rocker again and jerked it into motion, arms clamped across her chest.

Ingeborg sliced a piece of bread, added butter and jam, and handed it to the child.

She took it, dipped a finger into the red jam and licked it off, then attacked the bread.

“Slow down. No one is going to take it from you.” Was food so scarce that people fought over it?

Ingeborg fixed the coffee and took a cup in to Haakan, the squeak of the rocking chair following her.

“She’s up, eh?”

“Ja. Could you hear us?”

“I heard you and figured what was going on. She made it through the night without accident or incident?”

“I felt her crawl up behind me at some point. She’s a pretty brave little girl. She’s not happy right now because I didn’t let her put her own clothes on. I’m going to call Kaaren and see if someone can bring things over.”

Haakan pondered a moment. “Did you check her head for lice?”

Ingeborg flinched. “I didn’t think of it. Oh, ick.” Her scalp felt itchy at the thought. “I will. Scrubbing with kerosene will not be easy. It stings and stinks both.” She left the room and fixed another slice of bread to distract the child while she lifted and parted her hair. Sure enough. Lice. Now she’d have to strip the bed and wash all the bedding this morning. Why hadn’t she thought of that last night? The easiest thing would be to cut her hair short to make it easier to wash.

Crossing to the telephone on the wall, Ingeborg cranked the handle. She turned to smile at Haakan. “It works today.” His shrug said he was as surprised as she was. When she heard Rebecca’s voice saying “Number please,” she knew something was wrong. Gerald usually took the night shift and Deborah MacCallister the day. “Is Gerald suffering again?”

“Yes. The fever started yesterday, and the muscle cramping made him miserable all night. Dr. Elizabeth sent over some quinine—we had run out. He’d been doing so well, you know. We were hoping the malaria had gone away.”

“From what I’ve read, it never goes away, but the episodes don’t happen so often.”

“That’s not good news. What number did you want?”

“Knutsons’, but first where was the break in the line? We had no phone yesterday.”

“You’ll have to ask Thorliff. I’ll put you right through.”

Ingeborg listened for the ringing. Kaaren picked up on the third.

After the greeting Ingeborg continued. “We have a guest here who needs some clothes. She’s about six or so, I would say. Small for her age.”

“Where did she come from?”

“The Indian reservation, I think. But someone must have brought her here. Andrew found her burrowed into the hay, or she surely would have frozen to death. She slept all of yesterday, and the phone was down, as you probably know.”

“I’ll dig in the trunks for something and send one of the boys over with them. The milkers have already left.” Kaaren paused a moment. “What are you going to do with her?”

“What can I do? The hardest thing is she’s not spoken a word, so we don’t know if she speaks English or not.”

“Uff da. Mine can’t hear. You have checked for that, right?” At Ingeborg’s assent, she continued, “And yours doesn’t talk. You don’t even know her name?”

“Nothing. We only know that she is so skinny it makes you want to weep, but she’s one tough little girl. She has lice.” Ingeborg glanced over to where the rocking chair kept moving. “And she loves the rocking chair.”