Dakota Dawn (12 page)

Hay! She ran to the barn with her tattered quilt in hand.

Slipping in with the door open only a crack, she spread the quilt on the floor and forked hay onto it. Then gathering up the corners, she half-carried, half-dragged it back to the garden. Her side ached; her legs quivered. She did not dare open her mouth to draw in the deep breaths she so desperately needed—the thought of swallowing a grasshopper made her gag.

She staggered to the house, grabbed a kerosene-filled lamp and the matches, and dashed back outside again. “Stay there, Kaaren,” she panted as she closed the door behind her.

She unscrewed the top of the lamp and poured the kerosene on the pile of hay. She scraped the match across the sole of her shoe and tossed the flaming bit of wood into the hay. The fuel caught; smoke rose in tendrils, then billowed up. Grasshoppers fell. But when the fire dimmed, the horde resumed as if nothing had happened.

Carl found her, kneeling in the dirt, now bare of the beans nearly ready to pick and the corn that had been starting to tassel. Rivulets of tears streaked across her skin darkened by smoke and dirt.

He picked her up and gathered her into his arms, brushing a kiss across her cheek.

Nora sobbed against the wall of his chest. “I . . . I tried so hard.” She hiccupped between words. “N-nothing stopped them.”

“I know. Shhhh, now.” He murmured comfort, but Nora was beyond hearing.

“I worked so hard and this flat land—it hates me. My garden gone—my family—no one.” She thumped a shaking fist on his chest. “I want to laugh again—and dance—and see my friends. There’s nothing left. Not-h-i-n-g.”

“I know.” Carl picked her up in his arms and carried her back to the house. He brushed the crawling insects off the porch steps and sat with her in his lap.

“Pa?” Kaaren stood inside the door, peeking through the screen.

“You be a good girl and stay there.” Carl stroked the hair back from Nora’s eyes and laid her head on his shoulder.

“But Ma’s crying.” Her voice quivered with tears.

“I know. Ma’s sad.” Carl continued to rock Nora in his arms. “Go see how Peder is.”

“Pa, I want my ma-a-a.”

Deep in her own fog, Nora heard the cry of her child. She sat up, only then realizing the comfort and strength of the arms that held her. She hiccupped again and wiped her eyes with the edge of her tattered and filthy apron.

Oh, to be able to sink back and let herself float on that sea of calm that follows a cleansing cry. To stay wrapped up in arms so warm and safe. To listen again to the heart that thumped in perfect rhythm beneath her cheek. His two-day growth of beard scratched the tender skin of her cheek. How good it felt.

“M-a-a-a-a!”

Nora stood. When she swayed, Carl caught her around the waist. She looked up into his eyes so close and lost herself in their shimmering blue depths. With a sigh, she leaned her head against his chest again. This was home.

“M-a-a-a.”

She could hear the rumble of Carl’s answer to his daughter through his shirt. She took another deep breath and stepped back. “Let’s go in. She needs us.”

With Nora still supported by his arm, they walked up the steps and opened the screen door.

Kaaren hurled herself at their legs.

Carl picked up his daughter and patted her back. Kaaren reached for Nora and wrapped her arms around them both.

“Big bug.”

Nora looked up to see Kaaren picking a grasshopper from her father’s hair.

“Here, Ma.” Kaaren dropped it into Nora’s hand and giggled when Nora made a face and threw the insect out the door.

After feeding Peder, Nora took a pan of tepid water into the bedroom, closed the door, and took off her clothes. The water on her skin raised goose bumps, but with each swipe of the cloth, she felt closer to being herself. When she had dried herself and changed into clean clothes, she bundled her dirty ones, tempted to stuff them into the stove and burn them.

She shook her head. All they needed was a good washing. She tied on a clean white apron and, picking up the pan of now-black water, reentered the kitchen.

Carl, too, had washed. Moisture darkened his sun-bleached hair to deep bronze. When he smiled, his teeth gleamed white against the tan of his lower face. That stubborn lock of hair half covered the white line across his forehead left by his hat.

Her fingers itched to brush that lock of hair back into place. Instead, Nora emptied her pan of water into the sink and dipped new water into a pitcher. She unclasped her hair and leaning over the sink, poured the water over her scalp. With the last of the rose-scented soap she had brought with her from home, she washed her hair.

“Let me help.” Carl removed the pitcher from her hand and poured the water over her hair to rinse it.

Nora twisted her head from side to side so all the soap could be rinsed away. How wonderful it felt to have someone help her like this. How wonderful to have Carl, stern Carl, rinse her hair. She felt a warmth pool in her middle and spread upward to her heart.

“Thank you.” She wrung her hair out and, with the towel she had laid beside her, began drying her waist-length tresses.

“I . . . I think I’ll go get started on the milking.” Carl backed away. The urge to reach out and touch that rippling mass of gold caught him by surprise. He had only offered to help her. What was wrong with that?

As he brought in the cows, the questions remained in his mind. When he poured their feed, he stared at the flowing grain. Would there be anything left to harvest? What would he feed the livestock this winter? While he had had a good hay crop, hay alone was not enough. The pigs and chickens could not live on hay.

He thought back. The flood of Nora’s tears weighed him down until he felt like his shoulders dragged on the floor. Was she really so unhappy here? She had never said so. But why would she? When had he encouraged her to talk with him, other than to learn English?

He picked up his stool and started on the second cow. One bad thing about milking, it gave you too much time to think.

When he had finished and let the cows out again, one resolve shone clear. He had promised to send her back to Norway and that he would do.

He picked up the brimming pails. But, if he paid for her ticket, how could he hire a housekeeper? Where would he find the money to buy grain for his cows, food for his household?

He knew what life was like after the grasshoppers came. They ate everything in sight. Only those vegetables below the surface were saved. But his potato field was not mature enough to have set potatoes yet.

“God, help me, I don’t know what to do,” Carl did not realize he had uttered a prayer. He poured the milk into the skimming pans in the cool well house, keeping half a pail out for the house.

He stopped with one foot on the porch steps and looked up at the heavens. Stars peeked out through their windows in the black velvet of the sky. A breeze rattled the bare branches of the cottonwood trees.

He listened carefully. The whirr and crunch of the invading horde was no more.

He walked into the kitchen and set the milk bucket in the sink. “I’ll go into town tomorrow and telegraph reservations to New York for your ticket back to Norway.”

“But I don’t want to go,” Nora said.

“I will live up to my word,” Carl answered. “When we married I promised you could return to Norway.”

Nora could feel her mind running like a crazed thing caught in a maze. “B-but, you have no housekeeper for my . . . the children.”

“I will work something out.” He turned from her and went to stand at the window.

God, Father God. Please help me. Why does he bring this up now?
The prayer continued as she dished the baked beans onto their plates.

The ticking of the clock was the only sound in the silence. She had hurried to put the children to bed. And now she wished they were here to need her. Didn’t Carl need her? Who else would love his children, his house, and, yes—his entire farm—like she did?

She nearly dropped the plate of molasses-laden beans. When had love come into her heart?

“Your supper is ready,” she called as he stood looking out at the blackness.

Carl sighed as he sat down. He studied the food on the plate before him.

Nora watched him. “Do you want something else?” She jumped up. “I forgot the bread.” Returning to the table, she set down a plate of sliced bread and slipped back into her chair. She cast around in her mind for something to say to break the silence.

“The cows. . . they are all right?”

Carl nodded. He scooped a fork of beans and ate them.

“They will still give milk?”

He nodded again. “The grasshoppers didn’t bother them, just ate all their feed. Thank God I got the hay in before this happened.”

Yes. You must thank God,
Nora thought.
When you can thank Him again all will be right with you.
She forced herself to eat. Put the beans on your fork . . . chew and swallow. A bite of bread . . . chew and swallow. Swallowing was the hard part. The boulder, lodged in her throat, made it difficult.

“We’ll know more in the daylight. Sometimes, they skip whole fields. I’ve seen times when one farm would be wiped out and the next one not touched.” Carl nodded and finally looked at her, really looked at her. “We’ll know more in the morning.”

“Please God, let there be something left,” Nora prayed on her knees that night. “I am so confused. I did want to go back to Norway. Now, I want to stay here. How do I explain this to him?” She closed her eyes and let the breeze from the window cool her cheeks. One tear slipped from between her eyelids and trickled down her cheek.

“Your will, Father. Amen.”

Early the next morning, Nora walked to the edge of her garden. She wrapped her arms around her middle and squeezed against the pain that ripped through her. The sun, shining on what used to be her thriving garden, showed not one blade or leaf of green. The black dirt looked like no one had ever planted there. Gray ashes lay where she had tried to burn the marauders out.

The trees, as if caught in the nakedness of winter, raised empty fingers to the sky. The fields lay bare, like her garden.

As she staggered back to the porch, dead bodies of the winged creatures crunched beneath her feet. She sank down onto the steps, the weight of the destruction too heavy to bear.

By her knee, one tough cane was all that remained of her rosebush. Nora reached down with a shaking finger and stroked the stalk, stripped even of thorns.
I never picked one of your blossoms. The third one had just opened. I was waiting, for more. So many buds . . . now all are gone.
She buried her face in her knees and let loose the sobs that cramped her chest.

By the time Carl returned from the morning milking, her nose still dripped and her eyes were red. She wiped her nose with a handkerchief and tucked it back into her pocket.

“Breakfast will be ready as soon as you are.” When she tried to smile, her lower lip quivered.

“Where’s Kaaren and Peder?” Carl glanced around the kitchen.

“Still sleeping. Yesterday must have worn them out.”

“Me, too.” He poured sour cream over his pancakes and added a spoonful of jam on top. After only one bite, he put his fork down. “I rode out to the fields at dawn. There’s nothing left.” The words dropped into the silent kitchen and spread like ripples on a smooth lake.

Nora closed her eyes. “What will you do?”

“I’ll have to buy grain both for feed and for seed next spring.”

She waited for him to continue.

Outside on the porch, Brownie scratched at a flea, his leg thumping against the boards.

Carl shook his head. His voice seemed distant, far away like he was talking to someone else. “With no harvest, my savings will go to pay the farm payments. Or, I’ll see about another loan.” Teeth clenched, he growled. “I hate to borrow money, to be beholding—to anyone.”

Silence took over the farm again. One day on a return trip from town, Carl tossed a letter on the table. He shook his head. “Too late.”

“What do you mean?” Nora turned from kneading the bread dough.

“A letter from a woman who would like the job of housekeeper. She can even speak English.” He poured himself a cup of coffee. “Your reservation is scheduled for the first of October.”

Her breath escaped in a hiss, as if someone had punched her in the belly.

Carl tipped back his head and drained the coffee cup. “I heard about a farm that needs hands for the harvest. Can you manage here, if I’m gone a few days?”

“Ja.” She took in a deep breath, one that stiffened her backbone. It was now or never.

“Carl, I want to talk to you.” Nora formed the dough into a smooth mound and placed it back into the earthenware bowl to rise. As her fingers performed their usual functions, her mind cast around for the right words.

He started to walk out the door.

“Carl! Sit down.” She pointed at the chair. Appalled at her tone, she added a gentle, “Please.”

He sat. Back straight as a poker, face about as unbending, he turned to face her. A muscle jumped in his cheek.

Nora swallowed. Why had she said anything? She wound her fingers in her apron.

“I told you I don’t want to go back to Norway.”

Carl waved his fingers, like brushing off a bug. His look branded her a silly female who did not know her own mind.

“We agreed.”

“I know. But . . . but things have changed. You don’t have money to spare for my ticket. Peder and Kaaren . . . they . . . they need me.” Her heart wanted to cry,
and I care about you,
but, instead, she sat straighter and forced her errant heart to remain still.

“You want me to go back on my word?” Blue eyes drilled ice chips into hers.

“No, no.” She shook her head. “You wouldn’t be if it is me that changed my mind.”

Carl shook his head. “You are so young. How can you know your mind? What is best for you?” He pushed himself to his feet, the matter closed. “I may be gone for as long as a week. You’ll have the team in case you need them.”

Nora stood at the doorway to watch him swing himself up onto the bare back of the bay gelding. He picked up his sack that he had rested on a fence post, touched a finger to the black hat brim, and turned the horse to trot down the lane.

Tears, pooling in her eyes, made him shimmer and fade in the bright sunlight.

“Where is Pa?” Kaaren asked at the table before eating her mush.

“Gone.” Uttering the one word took much of Nora’s strength.

Kaaren raised her gaze from her meal to Nora’s face. Her bottom lip quivered and tears flooded her eyes. “Pa gone like my ma?” The question ended on a whimper.

“Oh, no, Kaaren. Your pa just went to help another farmer with a harvest. He’ll come back soon, very soon.”

Every morning, every noon, and again at bedtime, Kaaren posed the question. “Pa’s coming now?”

“Soon, little one, soon.” Nora hugged and petted both children, tickling Kaaren to make her giggle and tossing Peder in the air to hear his belly laugh. With no garden to care for, she concentrated all her care on the children and the livestock.

She sewed Kaaren two new dresses out of some material she had found tucked away in a drawer. She altered a cotton dress of Anna’s that hung in a closet so she would have something cooler to wear. The blue print fabric was on the table, waiting for her to begin cutting.

“You’re going to need clothes, too, one of these days,” she told Peder one afternoon. He waved chubby fists like he knew exactly what she was saying and agreed wholeheartedly.
They must have saved Kaaren’s baby things,
she thought, while holding the bottle for Peder.
But where?

She searched the house over and finally looked up the stairs. She had only been up there to change the sheets on Carl’s bed. With one hand on the rail, she mounted the stairs. Heat, like when she opened her oven door, met her when she opened the door to his room. It was as orderly as his barn. Clothes hung on hooks, good boots were polished and lined up under the black wool suit he had worn the day of the funeral.

She heard Kaaren calling from outside. Leaning over the table in front of the window, she pushed up the sash and stuck her head out.

“I’m up here. Upstairs. What is it?”

Kaaren came running around the corner of the house. “Hi, Ma.” She stopped, legs spread apart, and, leaning back to get a good view, waved. Her giggle floated on the still air. “Read now?”

Nora shook her head. “Soon.” She drew back in, careful not to bang her head. A piece of paper drifted off the table, so she leaned over to pick it up.

Carl’s careful lettering, so familiar to her after the long English lessons, caught her eye. She read, the words leaping off the page and branding her heart.

Dear Adolph,

I am writing to ask if you and Viola would take care of my children for me. If you could come for them after harvest since I have no one here to feed my animals if I leave. The grasshoppers ate . . .

The words blurred. How could he?

Baby clothes forgotten, Nora put the paper back onto the table and staggered down the stairs. He really meant to send her back to Norway. What she wanted did not matter. All that counted was his word.

She slumped into the rocker. He did not care for her then, not at all. To him, she was just the housekeeper he had had to marry to save their reputations. “Dear God, what do I do now? I thought he was coming to care for me. But, I was wrong.” The heaviness sat on her both inside and out.

The days and nights were so hot their clothes stuck to their bodies. Peder whimpered from a prickly heat rash and even Kaaren drooped like a flower that needed a drink.

The week stretched into ten days. Would Carl never come home?

But when he did ride up on the bay horse, nothing changed. Except now, Nora did not have the animals to care for and, with more time on her hands, she had too many hours to think. She tried to remember the good times with her family, to remind herself that she would be seeing them soon, to think about wading in the stream that rushed and tumbled over the rocks on its way to the Norwegian Sea. Cool water. Laughter and love again.

“Would you please milk the cows in the morning?” Carl asked one evening. “I’m driving over to the creek bed north of here to cut fence posts. I’ll be home before dinner so I can take the butter and cream into town.”

Nora looked at him, amazement dropping her jaw. He had not strung so many words together at one time since . . . since the grasshoppers.

“Ja, I can do that.”

In the morning, Nora went about her chores with a lighter step. Did Carl’s request mean that he was drawing out of his silence? Or that they would go back to talking in the evening?

But dinnertime came and Carl did not appear. Nora pushed the pan of fried chicken off to the side of the stove, along with the gravy and the last of the tiny potatoes she had dug up after the hoppers ate the plants.

She walked around the outside of the house and, shading her eyes, searched the northern horizon. Nothing. At the one o’clock vigil, she saw a hawk floating on the rising air currents. At two, a snake of fear slithered around her middle—Carl never broke his word—something had happened.

Nora ran down to the barn and, after grabbing a bridle off the wall and a can of oats from the nearly empty feed bin, slipped through the gate rails and into the pasture. “Here, boy.” She shook the can, calling the gelding. The cows mooed in response. At the sound of rattling oats, the dark bay horse raised his head and trotted toward her.

“Good boy, good.” Nora fed him the grain from her palm and slipped the reins around his neck. Holding the reins securely with one hand, she slid the bit between his teeth and the headstall over his ears. “What a good horse.” She murmured soothing words, all the while buckling the straps in place and leading him up to the fence.

At the house, she tied his reins to the fence and dashed inside. “Kaaren, bring me Peder’s shawl. We’re going to find your pa.”

How would she mount? By herself it was not a problem. She had learned early how to leap on a horse. But, what about with Peder and Kaaren? “Father, help me.” She took a deep breath and exhaled, letting her shoulders drop and the tension leave. The porch. Surely, the rail was high enough for her to slide onto this animal’s back and grab Kaaren the same way.

She led the horse up to the porch, grateful for his docile manner. Someone had trained him well. With Peder’s sling locked over one shoulder, she mounted the railing and slung her leg over the horse’s back. Her skirts bunched up around her knees, but she and Peder were secure.

“Kaaren, climb up on the rail just like I did.” Kaaren stuck a finger in her mouth and hung back.

Nora gritted her teeth. “We’ll go find Pa. Good horse.” She patted the bay’s neck. “See? Climb up now.”

Kaaren did like she was told.

Nora leaned over and, with one arm, grabbed the little girl around her waist. With the other, she settled Kaaren’s legs across the horse and firmly against her chest.

“Thank You, God. Thank You.” Nora dropped a kiss on Kaaren’s hair. “Such a good girl. Now, hang on tight to this.” She made Kaaren’s hands grab onto the horse’s mane. “Now, let’s go find Pa.”

Nora reined the horse around and out of the yard. Once on the prairie, she nudged him to a trot. With the hand that held the reins and guided the horse also anchoring Kaaren, Nora tried with the other hand to keep Peder from bouncing out of his sling. To her surprise, the rough ride did not bother the baby at all.