A Land to Call Home (30 page)

“I know. I thought the same thing. We’ll have to do something like this for your wedding.”

“If there ever is one.” Penny downed her cider as another young man tapped her shoulder.

“There could be one right soon if you wanted.”

“I’d rather go to Fargo. We have to write and tell your friend when I am coming.” She whirled off to dance the pols, followed by a polka, either of which would set a person to breathing hard.

Ingeborg glanced over to the area near the stove where the children
played. The babies were over at the soddy with the younger girls taking turns watching them and coming for the mothers when the children needed feeding. A long table off to one side had nearly disappeared under all the cakes, cookies, candies, and pies the guests brought, but now it showed the ravages of the partying horde. The scent of fresh lumber still filled the barn, since the animals hadn’t been allowed in it yet. Even above the music and dancing, she heard the thunder of feet on the bare boards and the shrieks of laughter in the haymow above where the older children played. Haakan had hung two thick ropes with a big knot at the end for swings, which proved a perfect entertainment for them.

The westering sun sparkled on the new windows along the side walls. Ingeborg sighed. She’d rather live in the barn this winter than the house. Every once in a while, she let herself regret talking Haakan into building the barn instead of the house this year. But with all the new stock, they needed the barn worse. Even so . . .

“Ingeborg, may I have the honor of this dance?” Haakan asked from behind her, his breath tickling her ear.

“Ja, you may.” She smiled up at him, glad they were playing a waltz so she could be in his arms.

With the stove red hot and the dancers red of face, no one felt the cold outside. About halfway through the party, Ingeborg noticed the men slipping outside more and more often. They always came back slapping their hands against their upper arms and shuddering “brrr,” but it wasn’t long before they went out again. Usually one at a time, sometimes two or three.

When she changed partners in one of the pattern dances, she smelled something and sniffed again. Sure enough, the man had been drinking. So that was the draw to go outside. Someone had brought a bottle, or from the heartier laughter she heard frequently, more than one.

“I think it is disgusting,” Hildegunn Valders said when she dipped a cup at the cider bowl again.

“I’m not happy with the drinking, either, but as the saying goes, men will be men,” Ingeborg answered.

Agnes joined them. “Are you are talking about what I’m thinking about?”

“Our imbibing husbands?” Ingeborg saw Haakan leave by the small door too. How come she hadn’t noticed the smell on his breath when they danced? Of course he could be stepping outside for another reason.

“Ja, Joseph has had his share, but I think Petar is too young. And he’s been out several times.”

“Keeping count?”

Mrs. Valders raised her chin and therefore her nose a bit in the air. “Well, my Anner would never do such a thing.”

Ingeborg cocked an eyebrow at Agnes. Anner had been the man she’d danced with when she first noticed the smell. His nose shone red as a polished fall apple. She wouldn’t want to be in his boots on that long sleigh ride home. His wife’s tongue was sharp enough to filet fish.

So what do I do? Ask Haakan to make them stop? Go out there and take away the bottle myself? God, your Word doesn’t say people shouldn’t drink, but it does say many things about getting drunk—and none of them good. Why did they have to bring something like this along? Who brought it?
The thoughts raged behind the smiling face she presented to the laughing people.

“Would you dance with me, Mor?” Thorliff appeared at her side.

“Ja, I will. You think you know the steps to this one?”

He grinned up at her, his eyes appearing more blue above the red of his cheeks. “If I forget, you will help me.”

“I saw you dancing with Ingrid Johnson. You were doing very well.”

His cheeks pinked even more. “She is a good dancer.”

Ingeborg bit back a smile. Ingrid had eyelashes as long as a cat’s whiskers and already knew how to use them.

When the women brought the hot food out from the soddy, the musicians put away their instruments amid applause from everyone. They had certainly warmed this barn up well. After everyone ate, the move began to head home for chores. Ingeborg, Haakan, Kaaren, and Lars bid everyone good-bye at the door and thanked them for coming. The last sleigh to leave held the Baard clan. Agnes was driving, Knute and Swen up on the seat beside her. Joseph and Petar sat in the back with the younger children, all buried up to their noses in elk robes and quilts.

Ingeborg quirked an eyebrow, and Agnes shook her head. There was no further need for speech concerning what had gone on. She waved them off and turned back to the barn.

After they cleared away the tables made of sawhorses and boards covered with tablecloths, Thorliff began hauling in straw for the cow stanchions. They would milk in the new barn for the first time. When all twelve milk cows were lined up, their heads facing the
center of the barn, all the Bjorklunds stopped to admire the sight. Thorliff poured a measure of grain for each in the long manger in front of them, and the men began milking. With three of them at it, the women returned to the soddy. They now had all the milk cows in one place, and the sod barn at Lars and Kaaren’s would be used to house the young stock and the bull.

“That was the best party ever, I think.” Kaaren leaned over the bed and picked up the fussing Sophie.

Solveig propped her leg up on the stool in front of the rocking chair. She leaned forward and rubbed below her knee, nodding as she did so. “George Carlson is a very nice man, isn’t he?”

Kaaren and Ingeborg swapped secret looks at the dreamy tone.

“Oh, really?” Kaaren said. “Guess I hadn’t noticed.”

The two older women chuckled. Ingeborg added, “What we’re going to hear about is the goings-on outside. Hildegunn Valders will make sure of that, unless of course she kills her husband on the way home and has to leave the area.”

“Even then, she will have an excuse for him and a scathing tongue for the rest.”

“Why, Kaaren . . .” Ingeborg stopped from saying the rest of her thought.

“I know. Don’t tell me.” Kaaren held up one hand. “The Bible says to say no ill of anyone. Actually it says of no
man
, so I guess this is permissible.” She shook her head. “Ja, I know that doesn’t count, either, but that woman makes me mad. Her and her nose in the air. Whatever makes her think she is better than the rest of us? Or that she should be able to tell us all what to do? That man she thought should be our pastor?” She rolled her eyes. “If he was the only minister on earth, we’d do better with ourselves. Scared those little ones half to death with all that thundering and shouting. He think we were hard of hearing or something?”

Ingeborg kept in her mind that Kaaren hadn’t even been to the service the day of the Hostetler preaching. Someone had sure filled her ears with all the news.

“Who told you about that?” Ingeborg paused. “Other than me, that is.”

“Oh, everyone. Even Thorliff. He was furious that the man made Andrew cry.”

Kaaren unbuttoned her shirtwaist and sat down to let Sophie nurse. After throwing a blanket over her shoulder, she leaned back
in the chair. “Guess I was a bit upset there and spewed it out all over you.”

“Ja, I’d say so.”

“He asked if I’d like to go on a sleigh ride with him sometime,” Solveig murmured.

Ingeborg and Kaaren looked first at the dreamy-eyed girl, then at each other. Laughter rang in the rafters of the soddy, setting the bunches of drying herbs tied there to rustling.

Ingeborg whispered from behind her hand. “We better get busy on that quilt we all started. I know Agnes thought it to be for Penny, but I have a feeling . . .”

“Me too,” Kaaren whispered back. “Hope she waits until the twins are walking.”

At church the next day, a few of the men were missing. There seemed to be a rash of headaches and stomach ailments.

“Must have caught something at your party,” Agnes said once the service was over. Joseph didn’t look too good, but at least he was there.

“Ja, my far used to call it the hops-n-barley sickness.” Ingeborg looked around the room. The twinkle in her eye brought forth one from her friend.

“I know. Interesting who is not here today.”

Penny joined them. “Ingeborg, would you write your friend in Fargo and tell her I am coming?”

“When do you want to go?”

“Today if I could.” She flashed a telling glance at her aunt.

“You could just take the letter with you. Mrs. Johnson said you would be welcome anytime.”

“Onkel Joseph said he would pay for my train ticket. I need to find out when someone is going to Grafton.”

“I think I heard the Helmsrudes say they would be going sometime soon. Why don’t you ask them?”

All during the discussion, Agnes kept her gaze lowered. When Penny left, she whispered to Ingeborg. “How I am going to miss that girl. I couldn’t love her more if she were my own daughter.” She shook her head, setting the slack skin under her chin to wobbling. “Sure hope she is doing the right thing.”

Ingeborg knew Agnes’s opinions about Hjelmer. “So do I. Seems to me that since she wants more schooling, this is good for her. In the years ahead, she will be grateful for that.”

“Why? We didn’t need more schooling. You learn how to be a
wife and mother from your mor and the doing of it, not from teachers and classrooms.”

“Ja, I know. But things are different in America. Here women can teach school and own their own land. You know she dreams of having a store one day.”

“Ja, she does. And Hjelmer, that . . .” She glanced out the side of her eye, stopping the words they both knew she felt. “Guess you just have to let these young’uns learn their own lessons.”

“You mean leave them in God’s hands?”

“Ja, that too.”

Three days later Penny said good-bye to everyone and left for Grafton and the train to Fargo.

“Uff da,” Agnes said, turning to Ingeborg, who had come over to make it easier for her friend. “She’s never been on a train in her life.” Agnes used the corner of her apron to wipe her eyes. “How will I answer to my sister in heaven if something terrible happens to her girl?”

T
he next Monday, Kaaren rang the iron bar for the opening of school.

“Good morning, Mitheth Knutson,” lisped a slender little girl. With straight hair the lightest of towhead, she stopped in front of the high bench Kaaren would call a desk. “I am Anna Helmthrude.” Her speech in English showed careful rehearsing.

“And how old are you, Anna?” Kaaren asked, also in English.

The child’s eyes darted right and left. She looked up again, a combination of fear and questions darkening her cornflower blue eyes. When Kaaren asked the question again in Norwegian, the child breathed a sigh of relief and her smile reappeared from its hasty retreat.

“I am five.” She held up as many fingers to accompany her Norwegian words.

“Well, Anna, the five-year-olds will sit in the front row.” Kaaren came around her table and lowered herself to look eye to eye with Anna. “I am very glad to see you here.”

The smile broke out in full force as the little girl nodded. “Me too.”

Hearing only a few words in English as the children filed in, Kaaren knew she would be teaching mainly in Norwegian, but she promised herself these children would be speaking at least the rudiments of English by the end of the year.

She looked over her group of pupils as the last one to enter shut the door behind him. While she waited for silence, she counted them. Fifteen in all and they had benches for twenty. She nodded. Most of the children she knew at least by face if not by name from worship and soddy raisings, but several were strangers. She
breathed a sigh of relief—the Strand boys weren’t present. Either their parents didn’t wish them to attend school, or there was one to the west closer to where they had finally settled. Kaaren hadn’t been to their home, and she didn’t wish to go. Sometimes she chastised herself for her unforgiving attitude, but most of the time she ignored it and the small voice that prompted her discomfort. Or at least she tried to. Deep inside she knew that one day God would call her to task over this attitude.