The Watercress Girls (15 page)

‘I hoped we would be in the same group,’ Evie said disconsolately to Rhoda, as they ate steamed fish with a modest amount of mashed, unbuttery potato, and peas.

‘So did I. Never mind. We can still be pals. Wish hard that we are about to receive suet pudding and treacle!’

‘No such luck. Here come the prunes and custard….’

‘Oh well,’ Rhoda was invariably cheerful, ‘at least we can count the stones and see who we’ll marry. Rich man, poor man – you can stop at rich man, for me! Though of course I know that my destiny lies in the mission field – my parents expect it.’

‘Well, I aim to be a dedicated teacher – my parents made sacrifices to keep me on at school, and so I should pursue a career.’

‘You might change your mind, Evie.’

‘Not much chance of that happening, while we’re here!’ Evie said, with a mock sigh. ‘I haven’t seen a single man unless you count the caretaker, and he only comes out when he thinks
we
’re not around!’

‘T
oday is special, it’s Mayday,’ Gretchen observed, as she fixed a big satin bow to Megan’s short black curls. The ribbon matched her yellow frock with the smocked bodice, which Mattie had made for her to wear now the weather was warmer. As she sewed she recalled herself as a child, dancing round the maypole at the village school, clutching one of the yellow streamers. It was still a favourite colour.

Gretchen Larsen, the youngest of seven children born of Norwegian immigrants, kept an eye on Megan while her mom and dad were
delivering
their fresh, farm milk and other dairy commodities, like butter, cream and cheese.

Despite the depression and the Wall Street crash last October, when even the small branch of their bank had been besieged by angry customers, Mattie and Griff had kept going somehow and were at last cautiously optimistic. As Griff said then, ‘The bank is only paying out ten cents to the dollar – just as well we hadn’t paid in last month’s takings before it happened….’

Bigger businesses than their small enterprise had been ruined, and many were deep in debt. Most relied on the barter system – exchanging grain for sacks of flour and other commodities for a share in a pig. Small family farms strove to be self-sufficient.

Megan, almost four and a half years old, was a fidget, as her Auntie Evie had been at her age, so her mom often told her. ‘You look like her, too!’ she would add. Now, she wriggled free of Gretchen’s grasp, grabbed her shoes and demanded, ‘Want to go outside!’

Gretchen snatched the shoes back. ‘I was about to tell you, only you don’t stay still long enough to listen, that this is the day we go
barefoot
. It’s traditional.’

Megan was puzzled. ‘Why? What’s that?’

‘We go barefoot today, and all summer, some of us, to mark the end of winter.’

‘Mom says you’ll hurt your feet with no shoes.’

‘Well, Mom isn’t here, and I’ve taken my shoes off too, see, and I’ll
keep a good eye on you outside to see you don’t step on a rusty nail or in a cowpat.’

Megan brightened up at that; she enjoyed poking the steaming crust of those big blobs. She wouldn’t mind treading on one of those, she thought. Besides, Dad had whispered this morning that she might pick her mom a bunch of flowers. ‘Let’s go, then,’ she said, reaching up to rattle the latch on the kitchen door.

Mattie’s garden was burgeoning. They usually had a surplus of vegetables in season due to her diligent planting. These were shared with their neighbours. Big families were given jugs of free skimmed milk and crab-apple jelly made by Mattie from the little sour apples from the tree in the yard. In return, their friends were generous with the little they had to spare. They kept each other going that way. Every family made the most of all the abundant wild fruit, families foraged for chokeberries (again so tart, with huge pips, that just the juice was used to make jellies), wild currants and juneberries, which were dark blue with tiny pips, and sweet. The children ate nearly as many as they picked.

There was a little clump of violets in the plot, like the ones Mattie had loved in her mother’s garden. Megan trod, cautiously at first, on the gritty path, then confidently, on the grass verge. She picked the violets and Gretchen added some longer-stemmed white daisies with yellow centres. They stuck them in a glass jamjar half-filled with water, but forgot to place it in the shade, to collect on their way back from their walk.

Gretchen took Megan’s hand. ‘We’ll go through the fields to the creek. I’ll tell you a story or two. We’ll have a paddle, and wash the dust off our feet.’

She didn’t know it, of course, but this was to be one of Megan’s earliest memories: swinging hands with Gretchen and wincing now and then when she trod on a hidden stone, but not saying, because she was listening to Gretchen’s Norwegian tales. ‘Ten times more snow in winter than we get here! My parents used to ski to school and they fetched shopping on a sledge.…’

The sun was warm on their bare heads, but the wind whipped around, as it always did, unchecked across the miles of wide open spaces. The satin bow slipped from her curls, dropped to the ground and nestled in the long grass which edged the crops, lost for ever. The water in the creek was clear enough for them to see tiny, silvery, darting fish, but still cold enough to make you catch your breath. Megan wished she had long legs like Gretchen, because the water came almost to her chubby knees.

Gretchen was sixteen years old. This was her first paid job. With her
round face, snub nose and long plaits she appeared young for her age, but she was very capable.

They were away from the house longer than they intended. Mattie came up the path to meet them, clutching the jar of wilting flowers. ‘Where on earth have you been!’ Then, seeing their bare feet, ‘No shoes? What are you thinking of, Gretchen?’

‘Day to go barefoot, Missis,’ Gretchen said simply. ‘The violets are for you.’

‘Oh dear, I forgot,’ Mattie said. ‘Thank you.’ She suddenly recalled the scolding she’d received from her own mother when Evie slipped up in the stream one day while they were gathering watercress. She must make amends, as Sophia had done when she realized she’d overreacted. Quickly she cut a peach in half for them as a treat.

‘Come along, let’s make some griddle-cakes and have them with maple syrup.’

How Mattie sighed in the warm weather when stubborn Megan insisted, ‘No shoes.’ Megan only gave in on Sundays, when she went to the
afternoon
service in the little Lutheran church with her mom, accompanied by Gretchen and her family.

Mattie thought the church looked something like an illustration from a children’s fairy-tale book. It was a simple design, painted white with fascinating small windows – diamond-shaped, oblong,
rectangular
and square. There was a tower rising above the central building with a conical roof topped by a beautiful gleaming cross. It appeared to be in the middle of nowhere, with the prairie stretching out on either side, and during the winter this impression was intensified when the ground was blanketed with snow. This covered the cemetery too, beyond the palings.

The main body of the church was furnished with pale pine; there were chairs rather than pews, a font made by local craftsmen, a polished wooden cross, and a little organ which was worked by bellows.

Megan sat between her mother and Gretchen, turning the pages of her hymn book when they did, though she sometimes held the book the wrong way up. The service was conducted in English, though most of the congregation were Norwegians, like a handsome lad called Chittle, which mom said was nothing like the spelling of his name, Kjetl. He had his eye on Gretchen, she added with a smile.

Griff, having finished the chores, would be there when they emerged from the church, to drive them back to the farm.

One particular Sunday, at the beginning of June; they arrived home to find a surprise visitor. It was Bert. He had taken his final
examinations
at college, and was now looking for a job. Even though he was
about to become a qualified engineer and had applied to the Great Northern Railway, so far he’d had no luck.

‘Thought I might help out here till then – that’s if you’ll have me?’ he asked.

‘You must have read my mind,’ Griff told him. ‘If only Bert was here, I thought, Mattie would be free to put in action a plan she’s been set on.…’

‘Oh, what’s that?’ Bert said, gulping hot tea from a big tin mug, which had hung in the pantry awaiting his return. He was unaware that young Megan was staring, fascinated, as his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down in his throat.

‘I’d like to take up an offer from the grocery store. To make and sell my ice cream two or three times a week on the premises, during the summer. They have a big freezer there. We would need to invest in an electric machine, with paddles to whip up the mixture in a bucket, much smoother than by hand, but we would use our own milk, cream and eggs.’

‘Mattie is already famous locally for her delicious ice cream,’ Griff put in.

‘Don’t think about it – do it,’ Bert advised.

‘All right, I will!’ Mattie said.

‘Well, how’re the cows doin’?’ Bert asked. He held out his hand to Megan. ‘Pull me out of my chair, eh, and we’ll go and see, shall we?’

Giggling, Megan pulled at his hand and he instantly sprang out of the chair. ‘Strong girl you got there, Griff.’

‘Gretchen’s stronger’n me,’ Megan told him.

‘Who’s Gretchen?’ he asked, as they went out and along the track to the meadow. The cows were now allowed out of the big barn – it had been a long winter, spent inside.

‘She looks after me while Mom’s at work.’

‘Got a job and a half then, I reckon,’ Bert observed. He had slung his camera case round his neck before they came out. ‘Had your picture taken lately?’ She shook her head. ‘Well, let’s see if I can get a good one of you today.’

Megan was a trifle nervous of the cows now that they were not confined. They lifted their heads from grazing the grass and stared at the little girl standing on the bottom rung of the gate as the young man with her, pushed it open, waited for her to jump down, and then secured it again.

Three of the young heifers decided to meet them halfway. Their jaws moved rhythmically as they chewed the cud. Their long eyelashes flicked at the flies.

Megan tugged at Bert’s sleeve. ‘Lift me up!’ she demanded. He
obliged, encouraging her to stroke the head of one of the Red Poll cows. Then he said, ‘Here, sit on her – she’s a gentle gal – she won’t throw you off. We got friendly when I visited last fall. I’ll take a quick snap.’

‘She’s got a bony back,’ Megan said, cautiously feeling it. But she wasn’t frightened because Bert was calm, and so were the cows.

She was still wearing her best Sunday shoes, but she got her wish to tread in a cowpat, and then wished she hadn’t, because despite Bert’s best efforts to clean her shoes in the grass, the stains and the smell were evident when they went in the house. Luckily, her dad saw she was in trouble and quickly removed her footwear before her mom could scold her. Bert rubbed her feet with a damp rag.

Gretchen walked over with a covered dish sent by Mrs Larsen for their tea. She’d heard along the prairie grapevine that the Parrys had a visitor.

Mattie introduced Bert to Gretchen and the two greeted each other shyly.

‘Stay for tea, Gretchen, then you can take back the empty plate, and Bert will walk you home,’ Mattie said.

Griff caught up with her in the pantry. ‘Matchmaking already?’ he teased.

‘Nonsense,’ she said unconvincingly. ‘She can tell her mother how much we enjoyed her honey cakes if she sees us eat them.’

That night, when her mom tucked her up in her bed, Megan said sleepily, ‘I wish Bert could stay for ever! He’s got his own room, up in the roof, hasn’t he?’

‘Yes, but he needs a proper job. He deserves it, after all his hard work at college. He won’t be able to play with you all day, Megan. Not only is he going to help Dad with the cows, and the deliveries, he’ll be working part-time at Harry’s garage too. Still, Gretchen will be able to bring you along to the stores for an ice cream when I’m busy there – that’ll make you happy, I know! Goodnight, Megan dear.’

‘Goodnight,’ Megan said, snuggling down and thinking of vanilla
ice-cream
cones.

Evie had graduated the previous summer; she sent Mattie and Griff photographs of the occasion.

‘Rose between two thorns,’ Griff observed, for Evie had matured into a strikingly attractive young woman and her companions, Rhoda and Noreen, looked much more like the schoolmarms Mattie remembered from her schooldays.

‘They both have nice smiles,’ she observed kindly. ‘And Evie says the three of them will be friends for ever….’

However, Evie was evidently keeping in touch with her friends by
letter, as she did her sister. It had taken her some months to find a permanent position. After a spell at a poor school in a slum area in the East End of London she’d returned home, to a post as a junior English mistress at her old school. She wrote to Mattie:

‘Well, “how about you?”’ Griff quizzed her as she sat at the
breakfast
table, drinking the first cup of tea of the day. He would be shortly pulling on his boots and making ready for the early milking; they could hear Bert moving about up aloft, doing the same. Megan was still asleep in bed; Mattie would not leave the house until Gretchen came.

Mattie put down her empty cup, folded Evie’s letter and slotted it back into the envelope. She was well aware of what Griff was getting at. He thought they should have a brother or sister for Megan before she went to school.

‘Oh, Griff, you know we agreed to wait until we could afford
full-time
help with the farm and the dairy – and now—’ She paused, shaking her head.

‘You’ve committed yourself to your new venture,’ he concluded. Mattie and Megan, he thought, were the most important people in his life.

‘Yes I have.’ She rose, moved swiftly towards him and hugged his shoulders as he heaved on a boot. ‘You know how much I love you – want to please you, but—’

‘You
do
please me,’ he said quietly, making her blush. Theirs was still a passionate union. The only time you disappointed me was when you cut your hair, but now, I like it.’ Her hair was thick again, curving round her face in a shining bob.