An Untamed Land (47 page)

I
have been in a far land, ja?” Kaaren asked, her voice a cracked whisper.

With her mouth open in shock, Ingeborg looked over at her sister-in-law. Kaaren had been putting on her own clothes when they were laid out for her. She ate when food was put in front of her, and someone, usually Thorliff, put the spoon in her hand. She had even been rocking Andrew when the baby was placed in her arms. But these were the first words she had spoken since the terrible sickness.

“Ja, that you have.” Each day Ingeborg had been hoping for a response, but every time she studied Kaaren’s eyes, she felt as though she were looking into an empty abyss. She stepped to the door and threw out the dirty dishwater. A warm wind blew from the south, even now just before bedtime. While winter surely wasn’t over, at least they were having a reprieve from the howling rage of the bitter northern storms.

Ingeborg finished putting the dishes away, banked the stove, and closed the draft so the fire would leave coals for the morning. Her nights were so short; she didn’t allow the stove to go out anymore. She sat in Roald’s chair for a blissful moment. If she sat too long, she would fall asleep right there and wake up freezing before morning. She knew, for she had done that more than once.

Kaaren kept the chair moving, the squeak of the rocker the only sound but for the dripping of the icicles. “How long have I been gone?” Kaaren spoke again, stronger of voice but still staring into space.

“Since right after Christmas. That was when the influenza struck.” Ingeborg picked up her knitting. No sense letting her hands stay idle. “That was more than two months ago.”

The rocker sang its song.

“Carl and my babies?”

“Gone.”

“And Roald?”

“He went to check on the neighbors, and we never saw him again.” If she spoke carefully, the words no longer carried feeling. They were just words.

“Was there a funeral?”

“No. We will have one when the ground thaws. Nearly all of the families in this area lost someone. We are among the fortunate. Some entire families were wiped out.”

The rocker faltered to a halt.

Ingeborg looked up to see a solitary tear slide down Kaaren’s face.

“God help us.”

“No. We will help ourselves. God is too busy elsewhere.” Putting her knitting aside, Ingeborg went to undress. After pulling on her nightgown, she checked on Thorliff and Andrew, tucking the covers more securely around them. “Are you coming?” She leaned over the lamp chimney to extinguish the light.

“You can blow it out. I don’t need a light for getting into bed.” Kaaren got to her feet, undressing as she went.

As the weeks passed, Kaaren returned more and more to her former self, but a sadness remained in her eyes, even when she laughed at the antics of Thorliff as he entertained Andrew. The sickness hadn’t altered the baby’s deep belly laugh, sometimes so infectious that even Ingeborg smiled.

Slowly Kaaren took over more of the household chores, especially when the lambing began. She also returned to her job as schoolmarm, allowing Thorliff to spend several hours a day at the books he so loved.

“Read this,” Kaaren said one afternoon, handing Ingeborg a piece of paper, precious since it was so scarce. “Thorliff wrote it.”

Ingeborg stepped to the window to see better. She looked up after reading the closely printed words of the poem. “He draws pictures with words.” She read it again. “But he is only seven. You are a very good teacher.”

“I believe Thorliff has been given a gift. It will be our place to see that he develops that gift.”

“Ja, someday. Right now he needs a new pair of pants, and his boots are too small. It is a good thing spring will soon be here, and he can go barefoot. I never did learn how to make boots.” Thoughts of Roald, who did all things so well, flitted through her mind, but she snapped the window shut on the memories immediately. Thinking of Roald only made her day weigh heavier.

Ingeborg spent half her nights out in the lean-to that housed their flock of fifteen ewes. The ram was locked in the other barn for now. She had moved the oxen, the dry cows, and the horses over there to make room in the lean-to so she could separate the ewes in labor from the others. Only one cow had any milk left.

Thorliff helped by feeding the animals in the other barn and by leading the livestock down to the river to drink so they didn’t have to haul water for them.

“We have twenty-five healthy lambs,” Ingeborg announced one night.

“And one bummer.” Thorliff sat cross-legged by the basket where the lamb that had been rejected by its mother lay sleeping near the stove’s warmth.

“Now if we can just keep the wolves away, we will have a cash crop come fall, maybe earlier. If only we had been able to cut wood this winter as the men did last.”

“Are you keeping any lambs for breeding?” Kaaren sat rocking Andrew to sleep. He’d been fussy lately because he was teething.

Ingeborg glanced up from the journal where she kept the farm records. A pang made her catch her breath. The only time she held the baby anymore was when she nursed him.

“Ja, I’m keeping the finest of the lot. And I’ll trade the best ram for another so we will have a new bloodline.” She couldn’t breed the young stock back to the old ram who was their sire, so she would have to find another stud. Not many people in the area raised sheep.

This year they would also have wool to sell, and Ingeborg hoped the sale of it would bring enough money to pay back the bank. If only she could afford to buy more cows. There was still a big demand for oxen, and she knew she would be able to sell all that she could raise at a good price. But a cow took nine months to calve, and then the calf needed a year to grow before it could be sold. It was nearly two years before it was strong enough to pull a wagon or a plow. Horses needed the same amount of time or more. The
return was definitely faster with sheep. Over and over, the many decisions to be made ran through her mind. She needed Roald. How dare he leave them?

“I think we’ll raise more chickens this spring,” Ingeborg announced, making a sudden decision.

“Chickens?”

“Ja, we can sell all the eggs the hens can produce, and come spring planting and harvesttime, the bonanza farm across the river will take all we can supply for frying. If we had a ferry or a raft, I could take the food stuffs over there without the long trip to St. Andrew . . .”

Kaaren shook her head. “As if we don’t already have enough to do!”

Several nights later, Ingeborg awoke with shivers coursing up and down her body and the hair on the back of her neck rising. She listened to one long howl and then another, followed by the yips of a wolf pack on the hunt. Closer they came, and then there was silence.

She started to settle back down, but something made her get up and grab the woolen wrapper she kept at the foot of the bed. She went to the window but, even in the bright moonlight, saw nothing. Was it safe to open the door? Wolves had been known to burst into a soddy if they were hungry enough.

She shoved her feet into boots, put on her coat, and picked up the rifle.

“Inge, what is it?” Kaaren’s low voice came through the darkness.

“Wolves, a pack of them. I’m going out to stay with the sheep.”

“But, you . . .” Kaaren stopped. Ingeborg could hear her admonition without the words.

“I’ll be careful.” She slipped open the door and let her eyes adjust to the brightness. Moonlight on snow carried much of the brilliance of early day. Her boots crunched in the snow crust, her breath creating a cloud as she tried to breathe without making a sound.

A snarl sounded from close by. Much too close. She stepped around the corner of the soddy in time to see four shadows slinking toward the sheep shed. She raised the gun, but before she could fire, another shadow flew across the drifts, snarling like a beast gone mad. The dark form leaped on the leader of the pack, and within a
breath’s time, the barking, snarling, and growls sounded loud enough to wake the dead.

“Inge, are you all right?” The call came from the half-open door.

“Ja, but I sure don’t know what is happening. You stay inside.”

She could hear the sheep bleating and charging around the pen. The fool things didn’t need a wolf to attack them. They could die of fright or trample the lambs in their fear.

The fight was out of her sight, behind the barn. If she could get to the barn door, she could get in and calm the sheep. Suddenly the snarls turned to yips, and three wolves streaked off across the prairie. She turned the corner of the barn and found one wolf lying motionless on the bloody snow. Another sat nearby, looking at her with that same steady yellow gaze she’d seen before.

“Wolf?”

He whined just a bit in his throat. Then, as if leaving her a gift, he turned and trotted back toward the river and Metis’ cave. Ingeborg stared after him, not sure when she was only seeing shadows. She entered the barn and went through the barred gate into the sheep fold. The cow lowed and the sheep bleated. Small bars of moonlight came through the opening between the sod walls and the roof. She walked among the sheep, talking to them in a soothing voice. As they calmed, she tried to check for injuries but without a lantern found nothing. At least there were none lying trampled on the floor.

She paused for a moment longer, savoring the night barn sounds. A chicken must have fallen off her roost in the other lean-to and was squawking her disgust. One of the lambs bleated softly, and its mother answered. The cow lay down again with a grunt and a whoosh of breath. Ingeborg closed the door and dropped the bar in place. She would have to see about getting a dog to warn them. She thought again of the avenging Wolf. He’d nearly cost her her life at one time, and now he’d saved a major part of her livelihood. Strange.

Back in the house, she removed her outer clothes and then her nightgown, the hem and halfway to her knees now sodden with snow. As she dug in the chest for a dry one, she told Kaaren what had happened.

“God sent us a guardian.”

Ingeborg snorted and pulled her nightgown over her head. If Kaaren wanted to believe God was watching over them, she could. “It was just Metis’ Wolf.”

In the morning, she dug again in the chest, this time removing
Roald’s woolen pants that she’d packed away. She held them up to her waist. They would need major altering, but that she knew how to do. She would begin as soon as she’d finished the morning chores.

“But, Ingeborg, you can’t wear those.”

“Ja, I can and will from now on.” She hung her skirt on a peg in the wall. “You can use this for yourself or make something for the boys. The wool is still good. But I will never trip over my sodden skirts again. If I have to do a man’s work, I will dress like a man.”

She ignored the horrified look on Kaaren’s face, and feeling more free than she ever had, she headed for the barn. She’d fire up the forge and work again on the plowshares. How would she ever keep them sharp enough once the ground warmed up sufficiently to be turned over? And busting sod was worse. Roald had filed that iron monster every few hours and hammered it back into shape at night. So far, her hammering made dents rather than smooth, sharp curves.