Broken Ground (23 page)

His yes, and all that I'm learning from Silvia, along with her ministrations, have provided a kind of balm, tempering, at least for now, the intractable reality of my expulsion from Union University and the reason behind it: Tobias's betrayal and, worse, far worse, my naïveté.

I go back inside. Still in my nightgown, I sit down at the table with Silvia. My appetite has returned; my mouth waters at the sight and smell of the steaming food on our plates. Silvia says a brief prayer in Spanish. She's told me she only prays in Spanish; she only dreams in Spanish as well. “
Cristo, pan de vida, ven y bendice esta comida.
” Christ, the bread of life, come and bless this food. Each time she prays this prayer, in the language that is slowly revealing itself to me, I am struck by the expansiveness of God, who receives all languages, all people, as His own. I never fully understood this before I sat down at Silvia's table.

“Amen,” we say in unison. In this word, only our different accents separate us.

IN THE EARLY
afternoon, Silvia and I walk slowly to the shallow, rocky river that borders Kirk Camp. She carries a basket of dirty laundry; I carry a box of soap flakes and a washboard. This is my first real outing since my arrival. Silvia reluctantly agreed that I could join her for this chore; she'd much prefer I were resting on my cot. But I pleaded with her. “After seven days of rest, I'm going stir-crazy,” I said. “That's a sign you've done me some good. I must be recovering or I wouldn't be champing at the bit like this.”

I follow her up a hill. From here we can see much of Kirk Camp—nearly twenty acres, Silvia says, bordered on the other three sides by two-lane roads. Beyond, the San Gabriel Valley spreads.

Silvia points at sheets of tin glinting in the far distance. “That's Cooper Camp, another Mexican
barrio
. There's competition between Kirk and Cooper. We think we are the best camp, both of us. We both have big festivals and concerts given by our musicians. Only
we
elect a May Day queen. They don't.” Silvia smiles. “
They
elect a Harvest Moon queen. Otherwise we are much the same. Our roads are dirt, our houses made of scraps. We don't have sewers or streetlights or trash collection. We give a good portion of our wages back to the farmers who pay us and own the land on which we live. This binds us together more than the competition divides. Cooper Camp is part of our family. No matter what the Anglo newspapers say, we share with each other—food, money, whatever is needed—rather than go on relief. It's a matter of pride, a matter of dignity.
El oro y el moro
.”

“The gold. . .” That's as far as I can get.

“And the glory,” Silvia translates. “That's what we were promised by the farm owners when we were invited to leave Mexico and work here. As you see, there's not any gold. There's not much glory. But we do the work no one else wants to do, and we are proud of our work. We are grateful to do it.” She presses her hand to her belly. “For our children, if nothing else.”

My head hurts again. The hike is taking its toll; I'm having a hard time keeping track of what Silvia is saying.

“You're out of breath, Ruth.”

I try to smile. “I'm fine. I've been sitting at a desk these last months, that's all, and then resting like some fancy lady at your place. Look at you, the weight you're carrying! I have nothing to complain about.”

We stand at the riverbank now. There are other people working here as well—elderly women doing wash, as the younger women of Kirk Camp are busy in the fields. Children too young to be picking fruit—it's strawberry season, Silvia has told me—play in the shallows. I'd venture none of these children is older than three or four. Some are new to walking, unsteady on their feet. There are babies, too, carried by the old women in slings on their backs. The women who notice me stare at me as if I'm a ghost. Indeed, I feel ghostly in my white skin. I'm the only white person here. But then they see Silvia, and her presence seems to relieve them. They turn back to their work.

Silvia swings the basket to the ground, lowers herself to sit on a fallen log, and wraps her arms around her middle. The sunlight glances harshly off the water. I shade my eyes with my hand. If I'm not careful, I'll get worse. Even more so, Silvia. The blood has drained from her face. The dark shadows lurking beneath her eyes look more like bruises now. I hadn't known she could look this spent. I hadn't known she could
be
this spent. I might get a bad headache, but if Silvia's not careful, she'll hurt herself and the baby.

“Your turn to rest,” I say firmly.

Before Silvia can protest, I lug the basket to the riverbank, weaving my way carefully through the many articles of clothing spread on rocks to dry in the sun. I've never washed clothes in a river. I've used a washtub, yes. A wringer, yes. Clotheslines, yes. But none of these things is here. Only a sluggish river and the stony bank beside it. I glance furtively at the other women and follow their lead. Kicking off my shoes, hitching my skirt a little higher, I take an article of clothing from the basket—one of Luis's shirts, so dirty it's gone stiff, as Charlie's clothes used to do—wade out a bit into the river, and dunk the shirt under the water. The water is more tepid than cold, and I remember Thomas's sister, Grace, and the typhus she contracted. I won't think about that, as no one else seems to be. Even thinking about that is a luxury. I stir the shirt in the water, then lift it out, slosh back to the riverbank, and shake soap flakes from the box onto the wet fabric. The other women scrub and beat their wet things against the rocks in the river's shallows. Their work makes a steady, shushing sound as back and forth the garments go. When a piece of clothing comes down like a whip, drops of water fly, through which the little children purposefully run, their clothing clinging to their bodies like a wet second skin. They remind me of puppies, or more, river otters, in their play. I practice with Luis's shirt, cracking it down on the water's surface, and soon I'm sending out sprays of water, too. The children run my way, dashing through drops and the prisms cast by the sun. My heart lifts with their laughter. I've forgotten what it's like to make someone happy.

“Thank you!” Silvia calls from where she sits on the riverbank, resting her back against a fallen tree.

“
Es mi placer,
” I say.

The longer I work at the washing, the more it does become my pleasure. I am clumsy compared to the other women, and I move much more slowly, trying to stay steady on my feet. But soon I realize this is a benefit. The children, seeing how much I'm sloshing about, gravitate to me. They seem to think I intend to get wet. Soon I am as drenched as they are; there's no reason why I should try to stay dry. I wade deeper and deeper into the water. It's not just fun; it feels good to boot—good to get really, truly clean. (Assuming the water is clean; I try not to swallow it.) Between dunking, scrubbing, and wringing out wet things, I cut my hand through the current so that arcs of water spew over the kids, who are soon splashing me in return. The women watch my antics, laughing and murmuring to one another. They might be laughing at me; they might be laughing with me. For the moment, I don't care.

I'm washing the last thing in the basket—one of Silvia's dresses—when my feet skid out from beneath me and I go down, bubbles and dress churning in the murk all around. The slow current prods me, its pull surprisingly strong, and I panic. I claw my way to the surface, gasping for air, to see the children doubled over, they're laughing so hard. The elderly women laugh, too, more openly this time, and two of them wade out to me and help me back to shore. “
Gracias,
” I say, and they laugh at this, too—at my clunky accent. I join in, not wanting them to think I'm offended.

I spread out Silvia's dress to dry, as I have all the other clothes, then go to sit beside her.

“Well done,” she says.

“I hope so.” I work on wringing out my dress.

“You made some friends, Ruth.” I turn to see the children edging toward us. With a suppressed groan, Silvia tries to get up. I stand to help her. “It will take some time for the things to dry. I think we should go back and rest while they do,” she says. “I will tell the other women we will be back soon, or they will do our work for us.”

“I don't mind waiting here.” I catch Silvia frowning at me. “I'll take it easy, I promise! But perhaps I should walk you home and then return?”

“
If
you take it easy.” She sighs, glances again at the children. “You want to teach? Maybe even these littlest can learn something,
claro
?”

“
Claro
.”

BY THE TIME
the clothes are dry—as dry as they're going to get, with the sun lowering in the sky—the children and I have made mud pies. I have been a very slow-moving horse to ride. We've all been horses in a herd, with me the oldest, most cautious one. We've pretended to be other animals, too—birds, cats, dogs. We don't have to speak each other's language or, as is true of some of the littlest ones, say much at all. We understand each other well enough.

Toward the end of our time, I sit down to take a rest. A few of the youngest children curl up next to me; soon they are asleep. The others continue to play. They cast frequent looks my way. It's all I can do to keep from joining them, but the throbbing at the back of my skull, and the little girl nestled in my lap, ensure that I stay put.

In the sun, resting with children all around, I find myself at ease for the first time since my expulsion. I consider writing Mother and Miss Berger, and it doesn't seem an impossible task. What will I tell them? The truth: where I am now, and how I came to be here, and how I hope to stay awhile. If college was all theory, then assisting at Kirk Camp could be considered practice. I could say that. I form sentences in my mind, transcribe them on imaginary pages, the letters I will send to Mother and Miss Berger:
Kirk Camp will be its own kind of education. In fact, my schooling here has already begun.

When the other women begin to collect their laundry, I rouse the children and gather up Silvia and Luis's clothes. I join them, lugging and dragging laundry up the hill. Some of the children accompany me, chattering away, laughing and lending a hand. But once we reach the camp, they scatter to follow the other women down various streets and paths, heading toward the places they call home.

I find Silvia asleep on the narrow mattress she shares with Luis. She undid her braid; her hair spreads in loose black waves across her pillow. She stirs, made restless by the sound of the door opening and closing, but she doesn't wake. Quietly, I set the basket of folded clothes at the foot of her bed. The clock on the floor beside Silvia reads five. I want to lie down, too, especially as six o'clock, Thomas's dinner break, is fast approaching. I've been hoping that tonight I might watch him teach for the first time. A rest might make this possible.

I start toward my cot, but then I see Silvia's black book open on the table. This is the book she searched through for the proper herbs and methods to nurse my concussion. From it, she deduced what dried plant leaves would work best. She took me out to the garden she'd established behind the cabin; it grew in a carefully tended bed much like those Thomas and I built for his parents. Netting covered the plants—protection against birds, insects, and animals. Silvia lifted a swatch of the netting and picked a handful of leaves. Along with the growing things, dried herbs bound in tight bouquets hung upside down from the edge of the shack's roof, which is woven from palm fronds. Silvia took down a few of these as well, and then we went back inside. “I inherited my work,” she told me as she ground the herbs, using a mortar and pestle. And then she revealed that the black book had originated with a long-deceased grandmother. The book had been supplemented with new discoveries and understanding acquired by later generations of women in the family. Silvia pointed out certain pages, written in an unfamiliar language. “
Nahuatl
. The old way of speaking,” she explained. Descriptions and directions were written in the book in Latin and Spanish as well, on pages stiff and stained with age, and peppered with pressed leaves, flowers, and herbs, exacting drawings of trees and animals, and anatomical sketches—parts of the body, whole, sound, and vital; parts of the body, injured, diseased, or infirm. There were sketches of women ministering to other women and men—applying ointments or poultices, binding wounds and broken limbs, too.

With a start, I see that the book is open to a series of sketches of a woman giving birth.

I turn quickly to Silvia. She lies on her side, facing me, frowning in her sleep, eyebrows drawn together like the wings of a blackbird. She is sweating, her upper lip wet, her simple dress damp at the scooped neckline and beneath her breasts. Her strong brown arms hold her belly protectively. She's kicked off the blanket; below her knees, her bare calves and feet are exposed. I catch my breath at the sight of her ankles. They are terribly swollen, swollen as I've never seen before—skin straining, mottled red and purple with broken blood vessels. Her dusty feet are puffy, too, deeply marked by the straps of her woven sandals, toes ballooning around jagged nails. Silvia is a bird-boned woman turned bear-like at her ankles and feet. Two months until her due date. If this swelling isn't relieved, how will she endure it?

I choose not to lie down on my cot after all. I sit at the table, and squinting through my headache, try to understand the words and the pictures on the pages before me. This page was written in Spanish, but the language used is far more sophisticated than anything I know. I carefully turn the brittle pages, trying to find a sketch of a pregnant woman with swollen limbs, or a sketch of swollen ankles and feet—anything that might illuminate Silvia's condition. But there's nothing that I can decipher.