“Let me go get more change.”
~~~
The dinner was delicious. Emil and Paul, the boarders, helped with the clean-up and soon everyone was lounging and dozing in the parlor, thankful they weren’t outside in the gray, cold, freezing drizzle of the late afternoon.
“All I can say is, those people ye cooked for in Chicago better have appreciated what a talent ye were and still are,” Liam said to Saimi. He was lying on the parlor floor next to Ellen.
Saimi smiled a ‘thanks’. “I tink I go make some coffee.”
“I can’t believe I ate all dat,” Ellen moaned. “I loved the stuffing and the pie.”
“You have to write everytink down in paper for me, how to make it,” Eva said. “I like stuffink and gravy.”
“The pumpkin pie,” Liam said dreamily, “with the whipped cream. It was nothin’ short of heavenly…”
“Dere is still more,” Saimi said. She left the parlor for the kitchen.
“Liam, I have been tinkink,” Eva said a short while later.
“Should I be nervous?” he asked, quickly propping up on his elbow, feigning trepidation.
“Vhy you say dat?” she asked with a furrowed brow.
Feeling slight regret, it was lost in translation, but smiling anyway, he said, “Never mind, what have you been thinkin’?”
“Vhy not Annie come here, if sees still vant to come to America?”
“I’ll have to write and ask. If she wants to come, I’d love to have her. I take it then, ye wouldn’t mind?”
“I know how mutts you miss. You love her like modder. I see you vit her ledders how mutts you read over.”
“It’s been so long, and she hasn’t said anything about comin’”
“Maybe she don’t wanna puss. Sees need you ask first.”
“I’ll write tonight, then. Wouldn’t it be grand?” he murmured.
Chapter 15
Two weeks before Christmas, Eva was seven and a half months into her pregnancy. If she and Liam had figured correctly, she’d gotten pregnant that first time at the lake, the first week in May. According to their calculations, the baby would arrive in early February.
Eva was acutely aware of Liam’s concerns about icy steps and walkways. He demanded she avoid any stairs in the house. Saimi volunteered to clean upstairs and to fetch anything in the cellar stores. She also offered to help Eva to the sauna if Liam wasn’t there, or up the stairs to the bathroom, and on and on … Eva knew well that Liam was frightened of losing her as he had Dolly. Eva, for now, decided to stop arguing with Liam. There was no talking him out of anything. He wasn’t going to let go of that fear easily, if at all. But her empathy was waning, and her irritation was growing.
One early afternoon in mid-December, Eva relaxed in the parlor with her feet up on a hassock, knitting a pair of baby socks. Suddenly, the quiet afternoon was interrupted by a commotion in the street. She heard a horse whinny, men speaking loudly, and feet pounding on the wooden porch steps, frozen and squeaky. The door flew open.
“Ellen!” Eva exclaimed. She felt fear overwhelm her.
“Get back, Eva. She has the influenza.” Liam spoke with authority, carrying Ellen in his arms. “I don’t want you to be infected, if ye’re not already, God forbid.”
“My baby!” Eva followed helplessly as Liam brought Ellen to her bed. Saimi followed them into the bedroom.
To Eva, Ellen seemed half dead. Why hadn’t she seen anything that morning? Ellen had seemed a bit tired but willingly went to school.
“I’ll take care of this one,” Liam said. “You take care of the one inside ye by stayin’ away.” He started to undress Ellen and get her into bed.
“Saimi, can ye be my assistant?” Liam asked. Saimi nodded. “Can ye get me a pan of cold water and cloth, please?”
Eva stood in the doorway of Ellen’s room, her heart aching for her daughter. She knew Liam was right. She couldn’t tend to her. She had to tend to the unborn child. She implicitly entrusted Ellen to Liam. There was no other choice. He was a doctor, after all.
Ellen roused a little. Her fever appeared to turn to chills as Liam covered her with her quilt.
“Vhere’s my Mamma?” Ellen whined weakly.
“Olen täällä,” Eva called I am here, trying not to sound panicked. “Pappa Liam says I have to take care baby. Hees take care you. Ymmärrätkö?” Eva asked if Ellen understood. Her eyes welled but she put a good face on for Ellen. She could see Ellen’s eyes, glassy and un-focused. Her face was flushed brightly with fever that was now being overruled by violent chills.
“Yes, Mamma.”
“You and I are going to spend a few days together. How’s that?” Liam spoke softly and tenderly to Ellen. He put her felt bear inside her arm. “Here’s Karhu. He wants to be with you, too.”
Ellen tried to smile, but it appeared as though her chills and pain were growing too overwhelming.
“You take care of me?” she asked.
“As long as it takes to get ye well.”
“Tank you,” Ellen whispered, barely conscious.
Liam asked for his doctor bag. It had been left out front in the hallway by the cab driver. Saimi fetched it and set it down next to Liam.
“Saimi, every time that ye help in here, I want ye to wash your hands with soap and very warm water. And ye don’t cook the food for the boarders. They may have to eat elsewhere for a few days. I don’t want Eva to be in this side of the kitchen until this is over and I say Ellen isn’t contagious anymore.”
“Vhere I gonna go?” Eva said, giving it her all to stay calm for Ellen.
“Stay in our room, or the parlor. And I want you to keep yer hands clean, too. Ye can’t be with either me or Ellen for a few days.” Liam glanced at Eva. “Sweetheart, I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I wish it wasn’t happenin’, but this is what we have at the moment. I love ye.”
~~~
Eva knew that Liam was intensely worried about her and the baby above all else. She also knew that in spite of Ellen’s on-again, off-again feelings for Liam, he loved Ellen and wanted her to recover. He would see to that, she was sure. His eyes told Eva so. Eva retreated as she was told and let Liam set his mind to tend to Ellen.
~~~
“Her chills are waning,” Liam said to Saimi. He took her temperature under her armpit and read it. “We need to get the fever down, it’s too high.” He spoke quietly so Eva would not hear. He didn’t say how high the fever was—close to a hundred and four. Jesus, he thought. It’s time to get to work. “Can ye get some towels wet with cold water and wring them out? We’ll put them on her body and head to cool her off. Ye’ll have to keep them comin’.”
Ellen fussed and whined with the intrusion of cold.
“I know, darlin’, but they’ll take the hot feelin’ away for a while.” Liam spoke with a combination of doctor’s orders and compassion.
“I feel no good,” Ellen murmured, her brow creased in a frown.
“I’ll take care of ye, sweetheart. I’ll be here the whole time,” he said in soothing tones.
She coughed hard. “My head hurts.”
“Try to sleep now,” he said softly. “Sleep is good.”
“Vhere my Mamma?” Ellen's words were slurred, and she was on the verge of crying.
“She has to stay in the other room, sweetheart. Doctor’s orders. She can’t get sick. She has the baby.”
Ellen nodded, then drifted off into fitful dozing. Soon after, she went into another period of chills. Liam pulled the cold towels off and gave them back to Anna, asking her to re-wet them under the tap for later. He pulled the quilt over Ellen.
A while later Saimi informed Liam that she had met Emil and Paul at the front door when they’d arrived home from work. They were concerned for Ellen and went to Murphy’s to eat, agreeing to do so for a few days. Neither one wanted to have influenza.
~~~
The cold towels were changed many times throughout the night. Liam fed Ellen mehu that had been chil
led in the ice box in her favorite cup. The cup had the area’s indigenous animals painted on it. Liam got her to use the chamber pot. They had a chair with a pot that Saimi brought down from the second floor.
As Ellen sat on it, she suddenly murmured. “It doesn’t …Don’t let the raccoons in …”
“I won’t, darlin’, don’t worry about that.” Liam said, knowing what was going on.
“Dat’s fever talkink,” Saimi said from the kitchen.
“Yes, it is,” he said. He wiped Ellen with a cloth and put her back to bed.
“I … get the … push it.”
“Everythin’ is fine, Ellen, go back to sleep,” Liam spoke softly. He examined the chamber pot contents. “We’ll have to get more juice in her, Saimi. She doesn’t have much urine in here.”
Anna poured another cup of mehu and put it on the table they set up at the doorway. Liam sat Ellen up and slowly fed her the juice.
“Good girl. Ye drank it all.”
Ellen coughed hard and moaned in pain, but soon she was sleeping. She managed to stay asleep for quite a while. Liam took her temperature shortly after she fell asleep, this time rectally. It had gone down a degree or two. Excellent, he thought.
“It’s down,” he said to Saimi. “That’s good news. We can stop the cold towels for now. I suggest you go to sleep. I’ll be fine for a while.”
“I do dat right here on the day bed. Call if you need me.”
Liam sat in the rocker, dozing for a few minutes here and there. He would wake easily when Ellen stirred. He heard Eva up and about from time to time. At one point, she peeked around the far side of the kitchen. He whispered to her.
“Her fever is down,” he said. “That’s good news. I know ye’re worried, love. It’s not the worst case I’ve seen, but it’s ridin’ roughshod over her. She’s a tough nugget.”
“Sees good fighter,” Eva whispered, her voice choking.
“Darlin’, please eat somethin’. You have to keep that up, do ye hear?”
“I hear you,” she said. She had moved to their bedroom door. He heard her crying.
“I love ye,” he called. “Get some sleep after ye eat.” His heart ached for her, but she would have to tough it out on her own. He leaned his head back on the rocker and closed his eyes. He heard Eva in the background. He assumed she was getting something to eat.
~~~
Trying not to wake Saimi on the daybed in the kitchen, Eva ate some cold kropsu, pancake batter baked in a dish. She found it in the pie safe sprinkled with sugar. She poured a glass of milk to go with it. After using the chamber pot and washing, she returned to her bedroom. She tried staying awake, but soon found herself lying down on the bed. She pulled a quilt over her and began to cry. She wanted so badly to go to Ellen and take care of her. Ellen was as healthy as a horse other than a sniffle here and there, and it bothered Eva that the one time her daughter got really sick, she couldn’t be near her. She understood that the influenza was not severe, and she thanked God for that. And yet she knew it was not a mild case either. She calmed at the way Liam was being gentle with Ellen. He was truly good with her. After a while, Eva’s tears put her to sleep. She desperately needed the rest.
~~~
“Look how ye’re sweatin’! Ye’re soaked,” Liam said softly to Ellen when her fever broke two days later. “Saimi has a fresh nightgown for ye to slip into after we clean ye up a bit and change the bed.”
“I feel liddle bedder.” Ellen smiled weakly. “I still have bad headache and my cough hurts it. I feel sore, too.”
“That nasty flu-bug does that. It’s good yer fever’s gone now. It won’t be but a few days and yer Mamma can come hold ye.”
“Is Mamma all right?”
“Oh, aye, and the baby’s fine, too. She still could catch it, that’s why she can’t come to ye quite yet. Sometimes the bug hangs on yer clothes and in yer runny nose.”
“Are they bugs like outdoors?”
“No. They are called that as a wee nick-name. Ye can’t see ’em with yer naked eye. Ye have to use a microscope.”
“I want to see,” Ellen said.
“I can tell ye’re gettin’ better, ye’re interested in things.”
“You need a shave. Your whiskers are very dark,” she announced.
He smiled at her. “I can’t wait to get into the sauna, but only when I think ye well enough for me to leave ye.”
“You stayed with me?”
“Aye.”
“The whole time?”
“Aye.” He smiled.
As they chatted, he cleaned Ellen with a warm wet cloth. He wiped all the filmy sweat off her, then dried her and put her into a warm, dry nightgown. He sat Ellen in the rocker while he stripped the sick bed, soon to be replaced by fresh sheets and blankets. He carefully put the dirty linens into a basket that Saimi would take to the sauna to boil. He brushed Ellen’s hair gently and put a new braid in.
“Can I have some mehu?” she asked.
“Ye sure can,” he answered, and poured some in her cup at the side table.
After she drank the cup of juice, he laid her back in the bed. “In a while I want you to get some beef broth.”
“As long as I don’t have to eat too much. I do not feel very hungry.”
“Doesn’t it feel better now that ye’re warm and dry?” He covered her in the fresh flannel sheet.
“No more cold towels?” She lay back on the pillows. “I remember that.”
“No, sweetheart, we don’t need to use them anymore. That was to keep the fever from gettin’ too high. Now that the fever is done, we’ll just keep ye warm.” He sat in the rocker and leaned over to the table to get a book to read to her. He picked up a Mark Twain.
“I feel like taking another nap. Can you read to me later, Pappa?”
“I can surely. What would ye like to hear when ye wake?” He could tell she was running out of the tiny spurt of energy she got when the fever abated.
“Will you read the doctor book on all the diseases people can get?”
He stifled a surprised snicker at Ellen’s choice of reading material. He thought she’d choose something like Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn. Instead, Ellen wanted to read medical texts. He couldn’t wait to tell Eva that one.
“I will get that one ready for later,” he replied.
Ellen snuggled in with Karhu. Her brow was still furrowed. Liam stroked her forehead with his thumb until she fell asleep.
Once she was out, he put his head back on the rocker and breathed a deep sigh of relief. He was grateful for Ellen’s progress. He didn’t tell Eva about the four other children who had come down with the flu at the same time Ellen did. He was curious as to how they were doing. He hoped well. He would call Dr. Andersen later.
As Liam tried to relax from the nervous energy he had been running on for the last three days, many thoughts crossed his mind. He missed Eva. He marveled at the child she and Victor had created, and he felt sorry that Ellen’s father wasn’t going to be here to see what she would become. He thought perhaps Victor Mattson saw from wherever he was now. He felt comforted that perhaps Dolly saw him, too, and was proud of what he was becoming. Exhausted, tears began to flow through his closed eyes.
~~~
That morning was sauna day, and Ellen was sleeping. Liam watched from the kitchen window as Eva, with Saimi’s help, went in the sauna to bathe. He was still purposefully avoiding Eva until he washed completely and changed clothes. After Eva returned from the sauna, he and she crossed a wide path in the kitchen, looking longingly at each other. Liam made his way to the sauna. He breathed the outside air for the first time in nearly a week. It was cold, but fresh and clean. He stripped his clothes in the dressing room and put them in a special basket of linens and things that Saimi would boil later. He sat on the top bench, taking some steam, suddenly feeling how exhausted he really was. It reminded him of his days at school in Edinburgh and the long hours at the hospital. He had stayed with Ellen from Monday afternoon to just a whi
le ago, the better part of five days. Eva would be able to be with Ellen on Monday. It should be safe enough. He was relieved. He could sleep with Eva tonight. He was wondering just how “playful” he wasn’t going to be, he was so damn tired. His back ached from dozing in the rocker for too many nights. He sat like a lump on the high bench, just enjoying the hot, moist air and feeling his muscles loosen. He noticed, with affection, that Eva had fixed his buckets of water for washing. They were sitting on the far edge of the bottom bench.
Later, when he finished drying, he pulled some clean clothes from a basket in the dressing room. The clothes had been folded by Eva days ago, and were sitting there for someone else to carry in.
“Ye’re a good girl, Eva,” he said out loud, grateful that she hadn’t picked up the heavy basket. In his current mental state, he was beginning to see he was being more than a wee bit overprotective. He knew he should try to pull the reins back a little, but Dolly’s death could still be so raw at times. He loved Eva for being tolerant of him, although he could tell he drove her mad at times. She had not said much since September and the argument about picking apples, although he had given her much reason to. He felt remorseful and decided he would try to let it be. He became emotional when he realized how lucky he was that Eva and the baby stayed out of danger and that Ellen was on the mend. He realized he desperately needed to see Eva—to touch her, to have her touch him and kiss him “hello.” He put on his boots and coat and hurried from the sauna to his Eva, carrying the basket of clean, folded clothes.
~~~
Eva’s heart leapt when Liam walked into the bedroom. He put the basket of clothes down on the floor. She was sitting at her dresser in a flannel nightgown, combing out her nearly-dried hair. She jumped up and went to his arms. They held each other close for many moments. Then he kissed her thoroughly and long, leaving her breathless and roused. “I see my girl is gettink bedder and bedder. I say ‘hello’ to her from sink to her room.” Eva was feeling relief that this would soon be over.
“She’s a strong girl.” Liam kissed her again. “I need ye, Eva. Can we lie down for a while?”
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