RR05 - Tender Mercies (14 page)

“Mange takk. I do appreciate that. I just didn’t know what to do.”

“Well, I don’t think he will be so rough with her again. Thank you for putting me in mind of it.”

“Ja, since they stay outside of the community, I just didn’t know what else to do.” Haakan lifted his hands and let them drop again while he spoke. The silence between the two men slipped by, leaving a feeling of camaraderie behind.

“October sure is flying by, isn’t it? That’s that north wind warning us.” Solberg glanced to the north, but the horizon held no storm clouds, only the haze of fall.

The horses stamped and blew clouds of steam into the cold air. The jingle of their harnesses made Haakan step back up on the wagon wheel. “I’d best be on my way. We’re going to be butchering first thing in the morning. If you have nothing else to do, we can always use an extra hand.” He swung on up to the wagon seat and unwrapped the reins from the brake handle. “See you then?”

“I might do that.”

“Zeb and his family will be over to help, along with the Baards. It will be more like a party than a workday. And there’ll be klubb for supper.”

“Bribery it is then, eh?” Solberg stamped his feet. “I’ll be there.” His ears at least had warmed up—at the mention of the MacCallisters. That meant Mary Martha would be there. As if he didn’t see her enough every day at school helping the Erickson girls and little Anna.

He waved again at Haakan and turned toward the soddy. The package under his arm would taste good with a cup of coffee. Bridget had sent him some lefse. The pencils and paper he’d purchased, along with some things for his cupboard, promised him an evening of pleasure. Preparing the Sunday sermon took several nights of studying, thinking, and praying for wisdom, then Friday night he wrote it out. If he waited until Saturday, there was no more time to rethink it, and besides, many times he was invited out to one of the farms to join the families in whatever they were doing. Like this invitation from Haakan.

The cat greeted him with a meow and a winding around the legs, then leaped up on the chair, kneading and purring. He knew the routine about as well as the man.

“Already need the lamp, don’t we?” John took a spill from the can on the wall, then lighting it in the stove, he touched the lamp wick until it flared. His mother would say his lamp chimney needed washing, and she would be right. So many little things needed doing around here, things that he never got around to doing since school had started again.

After opening the stove draft, John laid a couple sticks of wood on top of the coals and watched while they caught. He should be out chopping wood, for the pile was getting low. Setting the lids back in place, he pulled the coffeepot forward and checked the reservoir. That needed filling too. But first the sermon. He buttered the lefse and sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on it, then he took his hot cup of coffee with the plate of rolled lefse and settled into his chair. The cat jumped on his lap, licked his chin once, then kneaded his way in a circle and curled up, his purr rattling the windows.

Solberg quieted his mind while sipping his coffee and enjoying the lefse. “Father God, you know I can’t do this without you. I want them to hear your words, not mine. Please fill my mind with yourself so that this sermon, this service, radiates your love and forgiveness, Father, that we can continue to draw closer to you.” He sighed. “How can I get them all into your Word every day? How can we survive without you?”

The cat purred on. The peace of the room seeped into his soul. He picked up his tablet and pencil and began to write. “Dearly beloved, I write this that you may know, and that knowing, you may have eternal life.” He continued with the passage from 1 John, reading parts of it aloud, looking for other references about the value of taking in the Word. As he read them, he wrote them on his paper, closing his eyes and being silent before the Father.

When he finished, there were more of God’s words on the pages than his, just the way he liked it. So often someone commented on how wisely he wrote, and he had to laugh. “Those are God’s words, not mine.” So often he said that. He read through the pages again, making some changes and thinking about what he knew of his people’s needs.

He knelt before his chair and rested his forehead on his hands. As he held each of his flock before the throne of God, he asked for wisdom for some, love for others, and always a closer walk of faith for each. When Mary Martha came to mind, he shook his head. “Father, she irritates me so, and I have no idea why. She’s so good with the children, and I should be grateful—believe me, I am—but one minute I think we could be friends, and the next she’s gotten under my skin again. I don’t know what to do.” He waited, hoping God would give him a burst of wisdom right then. Instead he heard something that sounded like a chuckle but convinced himself that it was the sound of the wood coals falling in the stove. His knees creaked when he finally stood again.

He let the cat out, banked the stove, and made ready for bed. When the cat meowed, he let it back in and climbed under the quilt. Tomorrow would be a good time. He always had a good time at the Bjorklunds and came away feeling like part of the family. Everyone needed a family.

Which brought up another thought. “You know, Father, I thought you meant for Katy to be my wife, and that didn’t happen. I really would like to have a family of my own.” He waited, searching his own heart and mind. “But if that isn’t in your plan for me, then so be it.”
I know the plans I have for you, plans for good and not for evil
. The verse floated through his mind. “I know that, thank you.” When he turned over, the cat resettled itself by his master’s feet and commenced again to purr loud enough to wake the dead. Not that it bothered John one whit. His last thought was that he needed to get up early to split and stack his own wood before leaving for the Bjorklunds’.

Two hogs were already scalded and scraped by the time he walked into the Bjorklunds’ yard. The carcasses hanging from a tripod with a block and tackle steamed in the brisk air.

“On three now. One, two, three.” Four men heaved another eviscerated carcass out of the scalding tank and onto a solid table where the scraping began.

“Thorliff, you and Baptiste bring in some more firewood. Got to keep this water hot enough.” Lars motioned to the boys. The ring of ax on wood could be heard from behind the house where the Baard boys were hard at work splitting the butts.

“Howdy, Pastor.” Joseph Baard looked up from scraping the coarse hair off the hog’s hide. “You want to take my place here or help grind potatoes for klubb?”

“I’ll scrape. How many hogs you doing?”

“Eight. Ten if we have time. I brought mine over here, easier than moving all the equipment.”

By the time they stopped for dinner, six sheet-covered hogs were hanging in the barn, the heads were boiling for headcheese, and what seemed like miles of washed gut lay soaking in salt water, being kept to stuff with sausage meat, which would be ground the next day.

The men and older boys took turns at the woodpile, knowing how much wood it would take to finish the day. While everyone had their own job to do, the teasing and laughter made the time pass like dry leaves blowing before the wind.

Solberg meandered over to where the women were forming the mixture of ground raw potatoes, fresh blood, flour, and seasoning into balls around a small piece of salt pork. Once formed and cooled, the fist sized balls were wrapped in cheese cloth and, when the women had made enough, set in an iron kettle over one of the fires to simmer for several hours.

“Hope you’re making some extra,” Pastor Solberg said.

“We always make extra. Why?” Ingeborg brushed a stray strand of hair out of her eyes with the back of a floury hand.

“Well, I wouldn’t mind having some for breakfast, sliced and heated in milk. Mmm, tasty.”

“Don’t you worry. You’ll go home with plenty.” She glanced up. “Astrid, stay back from there. The men don’t need a little girl under foot.”

“I thought Anji had the little ones over at Kaaren’s.” Agnes looked up from where she and Katy were grinding potatoes.

“She does. This one must have slipped away.” Ingeborg glanced around. “Thorliff, will you take Astrid back to Kaaren’s and make her stay there?”

“Me stay here.” The little girl’s lower lip came out, and her Bjorklund blue eyes flashed.

“If she don’t look just like her ma.” Agnes stopped turning the grinder crank and pointed to the child.

“Are you saying I get that stubborn look?” Ingeborg rolled her eyes and her bottom lip too, innocence in action. “Astrid!” The little girl looked at her feet but the lip stayed firm.

“Ja, you could say that.” Agnes and Kaaren, who, like Ingeborg, were in blood sausage to the elbows, nodded at each other.

“I am thinking that is where Andrew got that look too.” Pastor Solberg’s smile twinkled his eyes. He went on to tell them how Andrew went after the Valders boys when they laughed at Anna. “That Andrew, he is some champion of those he cares about.”

“Ja, and Andrew cares about anyone and everyone who crosses his path. But especially those weaker than he.” Kaaren wiped her chin on her shoulder. “That could cause him a problem sometime.”

“If he hadn’t sat down when I told him, he would have had a problem all right.”

“Dinner’s ready,” Bridget called from the door of Ingeborg’s house.

Thorliff scooped Astrid up under one arm and tickled her at the same time. “Come on, let’s go get the others.”

“There’s hot water on the wash bench.” Bridget pointed to the side of the soddy, where a long bench held basins and soap with towels hanging on pegs above. The women scrubbed first so they could help with the serving.

The first kettle of klubb steamed on the stove, filling the house with its hearty fragrance. With two tables set end to end and another in the parlor, there was room for everyone to sit down. Ingeborg, Metiz, and Bridget passed heaping bowls of klubb, potatoes, green beans cooked with bacon, mashed rutabagas, and fried green tomatoes, while platters of bread and bowls of pickles already lined the center of the table.

“Pastor Solberg, would you please ask the blessing?” Ingeborg smiled at their friend.

“Surely. Heavenly Father, we thank thee for this food thou hast given us, for the work of our hands, and the plenty of our harvest. We praise thee for such a glorious day and the joy of being together. Amen.” When he raised his head, the first thing he noticed was Mary Martha across the table smiling at him.

“Thank you. Now, everyone, help yourself.” At the head of the table, Haakan reached for the bowl in front of him, so the rest did also.

She has beautiful eyes
. The thought made John Solberg’s ears burn. He quickly took a slice of bread and passed the plate to his neighbor. With the food passing and plates being filled, the hubbub rose again, punctuated by laughter and the call to refill the bowls.

With amazing speed the bowls were emptied again, and as soon as the coffee was poured and Kaaren’s eggekake devoured, the men filed out to begin the next round.

“You sit down now,” Kaaren ordered Bridget, Ingeborg, and Metiz, “and let us serve you.” She shooed them to the table and began opening pans to see what, if anything, remained. “They about cleaned us out.” She scraped mashed potatoes out of the bottom of the kettle and retrieved three of the round sausages from the warming oven, where she’d hidden them earlier.

“Here, you can warm these up.” Ingeborg passed over a bowl of beans. “This was about as close to feeding a threshing crew as we can get. Shame Penny and Hjelmer didn’t come.”

“She can’t just close that store down whenever she feels like it, you know.” Kaaren pointed to a loaf of bread and signaled Katy to slice it.

“I know, and Saturday is usually the busiest day at the blacksmith, but it just don’t seem right without them.”

A loud screech from outside, followed by another, made them all chuckle. “Pig whistles.”

“Pig whistles?” Mary Martha look up with a puzzled expression.

“They are cut from the windpipe of the pig where the sounds come from. Those screechings you hear are the children blowing through the pipe.” Ingeborg pretended to hold a whistle to her lips and blow.

Bridget frowned and looked around. “I didn’t see Hamre. Where is he?”

“He went in to help Hjelmer, left right after breakfast. You know he wants to go back to sea, but maybe we should talk to Hjelmer about letting the boy apprentice with him. He doesn’t like farming much, and that would give him a skill.” Ingeborg closed her eyes, the better to enjoy her first bite of klubb. “You know, I’ve been thinking of stuffing some of this into casings and smoking it. Might taste good along with cheese and bread.”

“Our neighbors used to do that. You know, those up the hill beyond the Stav Kirke.” Bridget smiled in remembrance. “Tastes a whole lot different.”

“What spices did they use?” Ingeborg cocked an ear to hear what was going on in the other room where the smaller children were playing.

“Come on, Andrew, let’s go outside,” Gus Baard said. “I don’t want to play with all the girls.”

“Trygve isn’t a girl.”