A Land to Call Home

by Lauraine Snelling

  Kaaren nodded, trying to give herself time to think of the right words to say. “I see.”

  “You know, it is more appropriate for a man to teach a school, especially with some of our boys so grown already.” Hildegunn’s voice took on its usual bossy tone.

  That did it.

  “More appropriate?” Ingeborg spit out the t. “You weren’t looking for appropriate when Kaaren volunteered to teach and use her own money to buy books and school supplies because some people can’t afford to buy the books their children need. You were just grateful, some of you, for a teacher. In fact, although some of your children had a bit of book learning already, others didn’t know the first thing about reading or numbers when they should have.” The accusation caused two women to study the pieces of cotton goods in their hands.

  “Now, Ingeborg, don’t get your skirt in a twist. We don’t mean no harm by this. We just want what is best for these two little angels here.” Hildegunn frowned at Ingeborg.

  Just then Sophie let out a wail as if she’d been poked with a needle. Kaaren rose to her feet, grateful for the break. If she sat there much longer, she might say something she’d be sorry for later. She picked up the wailing baby and took her to the other side of the stove to quiet her.

  “Just who is this ‘we’?” Agnes asked in a quiet voice. “I haven’t heard any of this discussion before. I am more than happy with the way things are right now. Joseph is, too, and our boys always learned good, because for the last two years—before some of you even moved here—Kaaren has been teaching our families book learning. I tried, but she is so much better at it. If she wants to continue teaching, I say she should have that choice. If she wants to quit, then we can look for someone else to take over and we should count ourselves lucky she helped us out.”

  “But we have a man here who can do it now!” Hildegunn acted as if the matter were settled.

  “Does anyone have some blue pieces?” quiet Dyrfinna asked. “Blue would look so nice right about here.” Someone handed her a piece, and after she expressed her thanks, the discussion returned to quilting.

  When Hildegunn started to say something else, Brynja, the peacemaker, quieted her friend with a hand on her arm.

  “What have you heard from Penny?” Ingeborg asked, her jaw relaxing.

  “She is happy as a lark. She loves going to high school and loves working at the hotel.” Agnes raised her eyebrows and shrugged. “And still loves Hjelmer.”

  “Has she heard from him?”

  “Not one letter. . . .”

  “You aren’t serious?”

  “I keep hoping.”

  “You and Penny. I think she should have let herself see if she could fall in love with Modan Clauson. He is a good man, but—”

  “But he’s not Hjelmer.” Ingeborg laid down her row of squares. “I’m going to see if Kaaren needs some help.”

  “Thank you, but no.” Kaaren had spread a white cloth over the table and was setting out the food the women had brought. As was their custom, the hostess provided soup or stew and the others brought the rest—breads, sweet breads, jam, whatever they had to contribute.

  She checked the oven and brought out a basket of rolls. Laying a cloth over the top, she announced, “Dinner is ready. Come and help yourselves. Agnes, will you lead us in grace?” The women’s voices rose in the song and harmonized on the “amen.”

  After dinner they matched pieces, cut out others, and stitched for another two hours. Then began the exodus. Within a few minutes the last harness bells jingled away and the house fell quiet.

  “All right, you can scream now,” Ingeborg said, placing her hands over her ears.

  Kaaren let out her breath on a whoosh. “That old biddy has to have her nose in everybody’s business. Trying to tell me they wanted a man teacher so things wouldn’t be so hard on me. And Brynja and Dyrfinna, sometimes I wonder if they have a thought in their heads but what she tells them. One of them doesn’t even have children of school age yet. Pious hypocrites.” She ranted on for another minute or two, then slammed her hands on the table, only to lean on her straight arms. She shook her head slowly.

  “Guess I did almost scream, didn’t I?”

  “Ja, but that is all right. If you didn’t, Solveig and me, we was ready to scream for you.”

  “I was going to bring it up in church tomorrow, since three children have mentioned their parents would rather go on with a man teacher. Has anyone even asked Olaf yet? Does he want to give up the work with Haakan and Lars to teach school for nothing?”

  “I don’t know.” Ingeborg laid her hand on Kaaren’s shoulder. “But I will find out. I better get on home and rescue Thorliff. Andrew should be up from his nap by now.” She gathered her things but turned just before opening the door.

  “Whatever happens, we must remember that God is at work in this too.”

  “I know. Thank you for the reminder.”

  After supper that night, Ingeborg asked Olaf if anyone had approached him about continuing to teach at the school.

  He nodded. “Ja, but I told them I would need to be paid. Figured that would change their minds plenty quick. I don’t want to cause no trouble with Kaaren. She loves to teach and should be allowed to do so.”

  “I agree, but this might not be her decision to make.”

  On the way to church in the morning, she told Kaaren about her conversation with Olaf.

  “Isn’t it interesting that people have found time to get together to talk about this in spite of the blizzards?” Kaaren asked. “I knew nothing about it and wouldn’t have if the children hadn’t mentioned it. Were they that unhappy about me taking the babies to school? Or did they not like the way I taught? What was it?”

  Ingeborg wanted to wrap her arms around this sister of hers and wipe the sad, defeated look from her face. “Kaaren, don’t even think such things. We both know you are a fine teacher, and the way the children learn from you, why, it is nothing but a gift, that’s what it is.”

  “Then why am I being asked to step aside?”

  “Because some of these people think they are back in Norway instead of here in Dakota Territory where we are willing to try new things and new ways.” She turned her face away from the greeting by Brynja Vegard.

  Kaaren felt like saying, “Then they should go back to Norway,” but she refrained. She did not want to be the cause of further contention.

  “Just remember, Olaf said he couldn’t leave off helping Lars and Haakan to go teach until summer without pay.”

  Kaaren nodded. She had a hard time keeping her mind on the service led by her uncle Olaf. He had taken her place as leader of the services and now would take over the school too. In church, that was according to the Scriptures, but the school? What was wrong with a woman teaching the school? Other places did it.

  Late that afternoon two men from the church arrived at Ingeborg’s house. “We come to talk with Olaf,” Mr. Valders said. “Is he to home?”

  “Ja, he is out in the barn working on something.”

  “Working on the Lord’s day?” He harrumphed and touched the brim of his hat.

  “Looks like you and your wife were cut from the same mold,” Ingeborg muttered as they left. How she wished she could hide in a corner in the barn to hear what was said. What were they up to now?

  A knock on the door brought Kaaren to her feet. She waved Solveig away. “I’ll get it.”

  Olaf stood outside.

  “Come in, come in. You don’t need to knock. You are my family.” She ushered him in, gesturing to the coffeepot.

  “No thank you.” He stood on the rag rug in front of the door. “I come with a hard thing to talk over with you.”

  “Ja? Well, we will talk better sitting down.”

  When they sat at opposite ends of the table, he looked at her with great sadness in his dark eyes. “Kaaren, I do not want to bring unhappiness to you, please understand that.”

  She reached across the table and touched his clasped hands. “
You are my onkel. I know that. What is it?” Oh, please don’t say you are moving away, that you want to leave here, when the men depend on you so much. We all do. “You aren’t leaving, are you?”

  “Oh no. Not unless you want me to.”

  “Why would I want that?”

  “Ja, you might. Hear me out, please?” At her nod, he continued. “You know that I took your place as teacher only because you needed me?” She nodded again. “I did not ask to stay on there.”

  “I know that.”

  “The men have asked me to continue, and I said it was up to you, but that I wouldn’t work for nothing like you have been. You should have been paid in whatever they had if there was no money. That is only proper.”

  “Ja, well, that didn’t happen, and I wanted very much to teach the children. I even thought maybe we would have classes in speaking English for the adults so that everyone can learn the language.” Her enthusiasm made her lean forward, her voice speed up.

  He nodded again. “That is a good idea.” His shoulders drooped, then squared. “Today they offered me money to teach. Every family will pay something for each child.”

  “What about those who have so little? Some of them have barely enough food to send in the dinner pails for their children.” Then the meaning of his words sank into her mind. They would pay Olaf to teach in her place. They wanted a man that badly. They didn’t want her.

  She waited, a great cloud of sadness trying to push her right into the dirt floor. When she could speak, she said, “Olaf, I have never been one to go where I am not wanted. Teach at the school with my blessing.” Her voice broke on the last word. She rubbed her lips together. “But please, please be gentle with the little ones, Anna especially.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I am sure.”

  Just then Solveig and the two boys burst through the door, their laughter bringing in the crisp dusk air.

  “I will be going then.” He pushed his chair back and looked at her intently. “You are sure?”

  She nodded. “With my blessing.” As he closed the door behind him, she looked at Solveig. “Would you watch the babies for a while? I need a breath of fresh air.” Turning down Thorliff’s offer to go with her, she threw on her coat and draped the shawl over her head. Maybe if she walked long enough and hard enough, she could find God’s voice in the storm raging in her mind.

  That week she turned out the entire house, cleaning every inch. She washed clothes, sewed a dress for Solveig, baked bread twice, used up all the cream for butter, and against Lars’ remonstrations shoveled out the chicken coop. Solveig decided early on that staying out of Kaaren’s way was an act of wisdom.

  Only when totally exhausted could Kaaren sleep. But even in sleep, her mind refused to let go of the fiercely burning anger. Frightful dreams plagued her nights, startling her awake with heart-pounding frequency. Her stomach felt like a bouncing ball.

  Kaaren said she didn’t feel well enough to go to church that Sunday.

  “You want I should stay home too?” Lars asked, bending over her in the rocking chair.

  “No, you and Solveig go on. I will try to sleep when the babies are sleeping.”

  Lars looked at her and shook his head. “This is not like you.”

  But when she bolted for the basin, he did as asked.

  “Now I know why I’ve been so tired lately.” She stared into the mirror above the basin where Lars shaved and saw the dark circles etched under her eyes and the colorless skin of her face. Her stomach had been roiling more often than just in the morning. How had she missed it? She counted the months. February, March, April . . . they’d have a baby in September or October, about the time the twins were a year old. Would that God gave them a boy this time, for Lars’ sake.

  She felt some better by the time the quilting bee rolled around again in March, but like for church, she refused to go. Thorliff kept her up-to-date on things at school, and between Solveig and the burgeoning Ingeborg, the twins received plenty of attention. Kaaren felt like a milk cow, an extremely ill milk cow, what with vomiting at all hours. When she finally told Lars about the coming baby, he breathed a deep sigh of relief.

  “I thought something was really wrong with you, Kaaren. You scared me half to death.” He lifted his hands heavenward. “Now I can rejoice.”

  “I am glad you can do that. Maybe when I feel a bit better I will rejoice too.” But she didn’t tell him about the anger that burned deep within her. Anger at their neighbors for telling her to give up the joy of her life and stay home. “I don’t care if I never see some of them again,” she whispered to wide-eyed Grace. The baby only blinked. “Oh, my sweet baby, how I wish you could hear. It seems God isn’t listening to my prayers very much lately. I guess you could say He has turned a deaf ear.” She tried to smile, but it never went beyond a slight lifting of the corners of her mouth. Grace remained sober, too, staring deep into her mother’s eyes as if she could see clear to the wounded soul.

  “God above, I am so tired,” Kaaren murmured.

  One morning the Norwegian Bible in her lap fell open to a different place. For some time now the words had been just that, flat words on a flat page. But this time the words seemed to leap off the paper. “My will is only good for you. . . .” How could all that happened be only good for her? She laid her head against the back of the rocker. Could she have taught school every day feeling as she did now? Would she have had enough milk for her two thriving babies if she were rushing to try to keep up with all she needed to do? The questions marched through her mind.

  She turned to the New Testament to the book of Ephesians where she’d been reading. When she began on her chapter for the day, more words grabbed her attention and shook it. “Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: neither give place to the devil.”

  How many suns had gone down on her anger? Had her sadness turned to bitterness and taken root deep inside her? What would it take to rip those roots out if that were so?

  Solveig returned from Ingeborg’s with a wedge of cheese and a loaf of fresh bread. “We had some of this with our coffee, and Inge thought you might enjoy it too. She makes the best cheese.”

  “Ja, that she does.” Kaaren continued rocking, letting other verses she had memorized through the years bathe her mind in their healing power. God had not turned a deaf ear. He had been waiting for her to listen, as He always did. “And if you have been wronged by a neighbor, go to him and . . .” Had she been wronged? It felt that way at the time. Did God have her good in mind? It certainly looked that way.

  “Thank you, Solveig. My belly says that cheese and fresh bread would taste mighty good for a change.”

  “Were you this sick with the twins?” Solveig handed her sister a cup of coffee on a plate with the bread and cheese.

  “Not this long nor so violently. They say every baby is different. I know Ingeborg wasn’t very sick with this one, but I remember the first time. Uff da. And on the train trip west too.”

  That Sunday she joined her family in the sleigh heading for church. She would have to ask for their forgiveness, those who wanted a man for a teacher. How hard that would be. But then asking God to forgive her hadn’t been easy either—but it was worth it to have the peace she so loved back in her life.

  She was greeted with cries of delight and questions about her health. The ladies cooed over the babies and couldn’t say enough how much they’d missed her. Afterward she left Solveig holding the twins and made her way to the group of three women she had most hated.

  “Oh, Kaaren, it is so good to see you out and about again. I have been so worried about you.”

  “Thank you, Hildegunn. Sometimes babies make their announcements in rather difficult ways.”

  “Oh, how wonderful for you.” Brynja beamed and clasped one of Kaaren’s hands.

  “I have something to say, and please let me finish before you say anything.” Their faces sobered. Kaaren took a deep breath. “I have come to beg your forgiv
eness for being so angry at you when Olaf was asked to be the teacher.”

  “Oh, Kaaren, it is we who must ask you the same.” Hildegunn took Kaaren’s hands in her own. “We . . . we handled that so badly. Yes, I forgive you, but only if you can forgive me.”

  “I already have.” Kaaren took each of their hands and pressed them between her own. “I know now that this is what God had in mind for me, and I’m not sure I would have listened any other way.”

  “Ja, sometimes the still small voice of God is too still and too small.” Brynja bobbed her head as she spoke. “Please, can we all be friends again and meet for quilting? I have sorely missed your gentle presence.”

  “Ja, we are and we will. I thank you for . . . for . . .” She swallowed and blinked. “The sun is so bright.” She smiled. “Just thank you.”

  “And you.”

  When she returned to the sleigh where the Bjorklunds and Baards waited, she walked right into Agnes’s embrace. “Lord love you, child, you have a bigger heart than me, that’s for certain sure. I think we all need some fence mending and you begun it.”

  A sense of peace flooded Kaaren’s heart and soul, making the sun shine warmer and the wind sing instead of howl. The jingling harness bells sang with the wind.

  The next Sunday just before the benediction, Olaf motioned to Mr. Valders to stand. Anner turned to the congregation.

  “I asked Olaf here for a few minutes of your time to rectify a wrong we inflicted on one of our own. Would Mrs. Lars Knutson please come forward?”

  Kaaren looked at Lars, who raised his shoulders and shook his head. She stood and went forward as requested.

  “Things happened a while ago that weren’t done God’s way a’tall. All of us here would like to make it up to you in some small way, so we took up a collection to repay you for the books you bought for the school and, while it isn’t much as we’d like, to repay you for the many hours you taught our children. We thank you for all you did. The school would still be just a dream, I’m sure, if you hadn’t wanted one so bad for all of us.” He handed her a pouch that jingled when exchanged.