Stillwater

by Nicole Helget

  No, thought Mother St. John, the Nativity family didn’t have one tribulation more than this hodgepodge of misfits. An old red woman, who was a discarded wife. A runaway woman slave. Her child. Twins so young and helpless, they couldn’t save themselves from hunger, thirst, predator, or cold. No, she thought, she’d never seen or heard of such a sorry collection of human beings as were in this barn, where every sad tale seemed to converge and look to her for comfort. Even Jesus had his mother and the protection of a stepfather, and at least the weather was warm where he was born. These children wouldn’t survive five minutes in this winter. And these women and children didn’t have one man under the heavens they could look to now. Except Father Paul, maybe. Mother St. John was eager for him to come. She needed help and guidance. When will he get here? she wondered.

  “Forgive my blasphemy, Lord,” she whispered. Eliza’s eyes were upon her like the glare of an owl. Mother St. John raised her finger to her lips. “Quiet,” she said.

  Eliza nodded.

  “He’s got a paper on you and your son,” Mother St. John said, “but he’s hurt and drunk. Stay quiet and calm. I’m going to get you to safety.”

  Davis sat down in the hay and reached out to Eliza. She walked slowly over and let him hold the baby. Mother St. John smiled at him, then said, “When that man’s asleep, we’ll move you and Davis.”

  “I’m staying here with her,” said Davis. He put his finger in the baby’s palm, and she wrapped her fingers around it again.

  Eliza pressed her fingers to her temples. “He say anything about a man goes by name of Jim?”

  Mother St. John shook her head.

  “Got to have some paper and ink,” said Eliza. “Got to have them free papers quick so my boy don’t wind up a slave too.” She closed her mouth to trap a cough. “Be terrible if you let that happen.”

  “I’ll get them,” said Mother St. John. “I’ll make them. You’ll have them.”

  The baby girl began to fuss. Davis plugged his thumb into her mouth.

  Eliza mumbled about driving an awl into the man’s heart, something about poisoning him. Mother St. John went to the tool table and took the mallet and chisel. “God will bless our intentions if we heed His commandments,” she said, as much to herself as to Eliza.

  “God doesn’t seem to mind it too much from what I seen, ma’am,” Eliza said, softly but clearly.

  Mother St. John pretended to be searching hard for the tools by shifting them noisily back and forth. Though she would never admit it to anyone and didn’t like to indulge the idea for very long, Mother St. John did sometimes question the very existence of God. She was confident that Jesus had lived and died. The Bible said so. But the Bible also said a lot of other things that didn’t make much sense. So on the long winter nights, after reading a story to the children and trying to answer their questions (Why did Jesus raise Lazarus from the dead, but not my ma? Why did God let Herod kill all the babies who were innocent?), she knelt at her bed, reciting her rosary, all the while wondering whether that time on her knees was wasted. She tried to work out the contradictions inherent in her belief and was hard-pressed to do it.

  “We can’t know God’s plan,” Mother St. John said, again to herself as much as to Eliza. “We just have to have faith,” which is what she’d heard people say all her life, though she knew it sounded as hollow as an autumn pumpkin.

  Big Waters began sweeping again, sensitive to the need for a diversion.

  15

  The Amputation

  THE MAN WAS TALKING nonsense when Mother St. John returned to the infirmary. Something about tobacco pipes and salt pork and a tree he once saw at Christmastime, with candles all over it. She laid out her tools on the table and set the man’s foot up on a stool normally used for milking. She took the lantern from him and set it on the floor.

  “This should do,” she said. “You want something to bite down on?”

  “I brought a piece of leather that’ll do.” Beaver Jean unrolled the top of a little pouch that held his tobacco and jerky. He pinched a dangly piece of jerky between his fingers and then rolled it in his palms until it was as round as an eyeball. He opened his reeking maw and tucked the leather far back in his cheek, between teeth that looked few and far between.

  When he did, the bad smell rolled around Mother St. John and her supper came up into her throat. She swallowed and coughed. “We’re ready, then.” Mother St. John placed the chisel where one of the bad toes met the foot.

  Beaver Jean leaned over and shook his head. “Bigger chap first.”

  She moved the chisel over to the longer toe and picked up the mallet.

  “Whomp it straight and certain, lady.”

  “Holy Mary, guide my hand and make my aim true,” she said. When she smacked the head of the chisel with the mallet, the black toe popped off and flew a few feet away. She was surprised it had gone so easily. “Oh my.”

  “Didn’t even feel it,” said the man. He sunk back into the chair. “Oh wait. Now I feel it. Quick, do the next one.” He swigged a drink of ale. “The pain’s coming fierce. Oh, hell yes.” Beaver Jean turned his head to the side and spit on the floor. He swayed to and fro. He cupped his crotch. “Feels like I might lose myself.”

  “Be still.” Mother St. John moved the chisel and smacked it with the mallet. The next toe popped off too, and flew farther than the first. Yellow puss and thick blood spat out from the man’s foot. Then she moved the chisel once more and smacked the third toe.

  Beaver Jean wet his trousers. “Donkey-fucker!” he said. “Ye didn’t warn me ye was doing that last one. Dammee.”

  “What?” said Mother St. John, but the man only rocked and moaned. “Anyway,” she said, “there you be.” She wrapped the foot tightly in a cloth and lifted it back into the snow. “Keep it here for another little while, mister.”

  “That smarts fierce. Jesus Almighty. I wet myself.”

  “I hope that ends your troubles, mister.”

  “I’m sure it will,” he said. “I might need to rest here for a bit.” He toppled off the chair, spilled the melted snow, and collapsed on the floor.

  “Oh,” said Mother St. John. “Are you all right?”

  “Put my nag in the barn, would ye?” he whispered. “Alice gets cold.” Then he moaned a little, hummed a tune, and passed out.

  16

  The Priest

  JUST AS THE SUN set the next evening, blowing orange over the snow, an ox and cart, driven by Father Paul, croaked to a stop in back of the infirmary. He’d been summoned by Big Waters, and when he considered her advanced age and arthritic posture, he wondered again how she could be so sneaky and quick, especially in the wicked weather of late. Some talked of the powers of the Indian people to transform themselves into animals. Because of his belief in miracles, he did not dismiss the possibility that such wonders could occur. He only wished she’d be baptized and convert, so that he would be assured that any such transformation was the work of God and not the devil.

  The priest groaned as he leapt from his perch. His back and bottom ached from the long ride. Though he knew he had an important job to do here, he hoped to sit inside to rest for a while. Though he loved his basilica, he loved the Home for Orphans and Infirmed more. Whenever he walked inside, round, happy faces greeted him. Little hands pulled on his. Little voices called for him. Big Waters cleaned the place immaculately. Mother St. John made the infirmary a home, and the Virgin Mary’s presence cloaked it in motherly warmth and matronly blessings. Every room glowed, with fires in the stoves and fireplace. Simple curtains, embroidered with scenes of chickens, cows, horses, deer, and buffalo, dangled from the windows. The frost on the windows was scratched with the names of children who’d dared challenge Big Waters’ order to never touch her clean glass. Every nook held a place to sit down: on a rug, a blanket, a stool, a pillow. Small children and dogs and cats curled up on the laps of older children. Games and dolls and socks draped from the tables and beds. And there was always room for one
more at Mother St. John’s infirmary.

  But he knew that the enormous responsibilities wore her out, that she was stretched thin, worried about the health of the sick ones, the comfort of the little ones, the education of the big ones. She had said so in her last confession, rendered right here in a closet transformed into a small shrine to the Virgin Mary, where the children were sent to say their prayers or sit alone after being naughty. Together, he and Mother St. John had mashed in there and stood face to face. He had taken her hands in his, and she had said, “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.” Outside the confessional, the cacophony of fighting and crying and whining created a distraction. The children were as wild as boars. There was a crash, and she had said, “Oh. I’m so sorry. I have to go and see.” But he had stopped her and said, “Big Waters can handle it. Relax.” Then her eyes squinted and filled. Her lip tightened a bit, and he saw that she was holding back a sob. She tried to take her hands back and raise them to her face, to cover her crying. But he held them fast in his own. He noticed then how young she was. She couldn’t have been out of her twenties, though he had never asked her age. To him she seemed very mature, experienced. “There, there,” he said. “You’re a marvelous sister.” He pulled her to him and let her cry on his lapel. “You do the work of a dozen women,” he continued. Sometimes he imagined that he was the husband and she the wife, and all the children were theirs, together. He imagined lying next to her at night and whispering in the dark about the antics of the babes. He imagined all the things that husbands and wives do, but then would feel guilty and go back to his small room and thrash himself with a horsewhip for his lust.

  Now Father Paul put his hands on his lower back and arched backward and said a prayer of thanks for arriving safely. He didn’t bother tying up the animal, as it was the sort that would never flap an ear or even sneeze if its survival didn’t depend upon it.

  “It’s a good thing it was an ass and not an ox who burdened the weight of the Virgin to Bethlehem,” he told the animal, “or the Lord would’ve had to wait until December thirtieth to be born in the nice warm stable.” The ox flicked its tail at him.

  Despite the ox’s flaws, Father Paul felt affection for it. He gave the animal a slap on the back. The ox had come to him a few months back, in exchange for the cloth, sugar, turnips, and potatoes he’d brought to a starving settlement of about ten Norwegian families near the Dakotas. Life on the prairie was hard, more so than life in the woods, where animals and timber were abundant, or in the towns, where supplies were at the ready. These Norwegians were like other prairie settlers he’d seen: ambitious, hopeful, adventurous, but completely unprepared for this type of hard winter, the impossibility of travel, the frozen wells, rivers, and ponds, the lack of firewood and food to hunt or fish for, the madness that sets in with the imprisoning cold and snow and tedium for five months of the year. At the beginning of December, the families had been holed up for weeks already, and they were almost out of flour and down to their last buffalo chips for fuel. They already wore a doomed look: a certain round-eyed gaze, the cords of their necks jutted, the shoulders curled forward. These were not the kind who’d come through winter in great numbers.

  Sometimes, come March, whole families would be discovered dead. Last spring, some fur traders told him of a Dutchman who had slit the throats of his four children and his wife, rather than let them starve to death. It had been their first winter. There was food left in the house, a bag of beans and even a ham, which made Father Paul wonder whether it hadn’t been the devil getting into the mind of the man, rather than the threat of starvation.

  Father Paul hadn’t wanted to take the Norwegians’ ox, but those tall men were prideful and insisted, tying it alongside his borrowed horse, which took one look at the broad-shouldered animal, flapped its lips, and kicked at it. The ox sniffed at the horse’s oat pack. Father Paul shook his head and waved his hands to reject the beast, but the Norwegians wouldn’t be deterred.

  “Take,” they had said. “Works good.” They flexed their muscles.

  “Ya,” they had said. “Go.” They pointed eastward, eager for him to leave, it seemed. Father Paul thought they were ashamed to be seen in such dire conditions, and so he acquiesced. He pulled a few Bibles and writing tablets and pencils from his wagon and gave them to the settlers. These were all he had left to offer, and the quiet women came forward and reached for them with their long, skeletal fingers, some of which were red or charred at the tips from continually stoking the fires, to get the last bit of heat from every ember. When it came time, he knew those women might soften the pages of the Bibles and tablets in milk, if they had it, or water, if they didn’t, and feed them to their children. He’d heard of such things and worse—people eating their mud walls, chewing on their boots, consuming the flesh of the dead. He felt ashamed he hadn’t brought more for the Norwegians. He knew the ox was an extravagant gift in exchange for a few supplies, which wouldn’t last them through January, but Father Paul decided not to insult them. He told the men he’d pray for them.

  “We be good here,” they had assured him. “Yes. Good.” They tucked their hands under their armpits and nodded. Father Paul hadn’t yet met a nationality or tribe whose men weren’t like this: proud, to a deadly degree. It was the blight of his sex, and in his worst moments of silent prayer, Father Paul wondered if this bane was a remnant of God, the creator and the master male, the most prideful of all, perhaps. He punished himself for thinking such things by hitting his thighs with a hammer or refraining from a drink of water. Father Paul left the Norwegians, headed back east, and, as he had promised, prayed for their mortal and divine salvation.

  Within a few hours, he learned that the ox grunted for food and water incessantly, moved reluctantly, and emitted gas at every other step. Before they could return to Stillwater, the horse, whether by coincidence or a yen for suicide Father Paul didn’t know, ate an entire bag of flower seed—foxglove and lily of the valley—that he’d collected from the tribes, and lay down and died. The ox seemed pleased at this. Father Paul gave the horse carcass to the Indians to feed to their dogs, which apparently weren’t affected by the poisonous seeds, except for expelling some fragrant diarrhea. Those dogs, he knew, would be in the stew by winter’s end. “God works in mysterious ways,” Father Paul always said. Since that moment, he and the ox had been inseparable.

  After he slapped its back, the ox lifted its back leg to kick at him. But it was getting old and Father Paul easily avoided this limp attempt. “You’re not so ornery,” he said to it. Father Paul liked his role in this feral place. He knew he was witness to a great change in the wilds. Once, only the smoke from Indian fires rose in the sky. Now it was blurred with the dust kicked up by pioneers’ wagons and plows. Once, only Indian would meet Indian in confrontation or negotiation. Now white women traded wares with squaws in sod houses. Indian healers brought herbs to soothe the aches and pains of old white men hobbled by rheumatism. And where disagreements erupted, Father Paul rushed in. He saw himself as a negotiator, an agent smoothing the transition from savage wilderness to Christian civilization.

  As he expected, once he opened the door, a waft of warm cinnamon air met him. Mother St. John must have been baking. He hoped she’d have a bit of hot water or coffee for him too. “I got here at least,” he called. Three girls in brightly dyed flour-sack dresses and lacy bloomers bounded down the hall.

  “Mary, Lucy, Lizzie!” he cried. “Come give Father Paul a hug.”

  “Father Paul,” said one. “There’s a big smelly man here who never wakes up. Can we go pet Queen Victoria?”

  “Well,” he said. “Queen Victoria is fussy today, so don’t bother her.” He pulled a couple of slivers of jerky from his pocket and gave them each one. “Now go find Big Waters and ask her to tend the ox.”

  Big Waters appeared from behind a door. Father Paul had gotten used to the way she appeared like a sudden rain cloud in a clear sky. He didn’t ask how she had beaten him back to the infirmary.

>   Father Paul nodded at her.

  She ignored his greeting but walked past him out the door and took up the reins of Queen Victoria. She was no good with animals, but the ox was used to her, sniffed her pocket for sugar, and went along when Big Waters coaxed her toward the stable.

  “Bless your kindness,” Father Paul called after her. Big Waters didn’t turn around but groaned in acknowledgment. Try as he did, he could not get that woman to like him, and he had serious doubts that he’d ever be able to baptize her and save her immortal soul before she died. It was a failure that afflicted him. He’d recently thought he might baptize her in her sleep if he had the chance.

  Father Paul walked down the hall toward the kitchen and opened the door. On a pallet in the middle of the floor lay a big, snoring, slobbering man. Mother St. John stood at a table, throwing onions and pepper into a big pot, her remedy for the children’s sniffles and sneezes.

  “Oh goodness,” said Father Paul. “What did you do to him, Mother?”

  “Only what he asked,” she responded. “And maybe a bit more.” She gestured for Father Paul to have a seat. “I amputated his frostbitten toes and dosed him with morphine.”

  Beaver Jean slept fitfully, full of drink and morphine, on a pallet strewn on the floor near the fire. His big shoulders rose and fell as he snored like an old bull. The floorboards outside the kitchen creaked. Elmer and some other little boys tiptoed into the room and cheerfully waved their fat hands at Father Paul. He pointed to the sleeping man and put his finger to his lips to shush them. But they proceeded to approach the lug on the floor. They looked him over and poked him with the tips of their boots until Mother St. John turned and saw what they were up to. She took her spoon and spanked them each on the behind. “Out!” she whisper-shouted. “All of you. Out!” She followed them out of the kitchen, and Father Paul heard her scolding them in the hall.