Each summer Emma felt a bit more estranged from her own family, and the feeling grew more intense after her years in college. She was so excited and happy at Hancock, despite her poverty, especially now that Dr. Weatherbee had recognized her ability and had taken her on as a protégée. She spent all of her free time during the summer on the farm studying the biology books she had brought home and thinking about the natural world around her. It was as though a film had been lifted from her eyes and every living thing was seen sharply in full color and dramatic motion for the first time.
Her family expressed no interest in her preoccupations. Her mother scolded her for daydreaming and isolating herself in her bedroom to read. In fairness, Emma knew that none of them had been exposed to the facts and ideas that now beguiled her and they hardly knew how to discuss them. She would have been too self-conscious to lecture them about what she learned. She yearned for someone to share her fascinations. Henrik would have been her natural companion. He had enjoyed sharing her youthful collections of wild bird eggs, plants, and insects. But Henrik had gone to war and returned hollow-eyed and slack-jawed, preoccupied with private pain.
One evening as they were sitting silently on the porch as the hot air of the day cooled and thrummed with cicada song, Emma dared to draw him out. Henrik had begun shifting restlessly, which Emma recognized as a sign that he would soon climb into the truck and head for Stanton Mills.
She placed her hand on his arm. “We used to be more happy, Hennie. Now I feel kind of like a stranger living here. Mama and I don’t argue much anymore, but . . . well . . . I don’t know. I feel like my heart’s somewhere else.”
“Yeah, me too. Except everywhere else is worse.”
“It’s what happened in the war, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you ever want to talk about it? I mean, you don’t have to . . . if . . .”
He began to tremble. “I . . . I can’t let go of it. I don’t know why.”
“You must have seen terrible things.”
“Oh, God!” His speech became rapid, high-pitched with fear and confusion. “I saw men blown to bits. Their guts hanging out. Screaming. Begging us to shoot them. I killed a German. He came jumping into our trench. I think he got mixed up and thought we were Germans too. And I shot him. But it didn’t kill him. He was just a kid like me. He was crying and saying stuff in German. I couldn’t understand, but I knew there were words like ‘God’ and ‘Mama.’ The sergeant just came up and shot him in the head with his pistol to shut him up.” Henrik covered his face with his hands and wept.
Emma caressed his shoulder and repeated over and over, “It’s all right now. It’s over.”
“No. It’s not. I couldn’t take it. I always wanted to run away. I’m a coward. I was glad when I was wounded and got to leave the front.”
“No, Hennie, no. Anybody would run away. I would have too.”
“You’re a girl. It’s different. A man can’t run away. I was so scared.”
They sat in a clumsy embrace until Henrik’s weeping calmed.
“It doesn’t matter now,” Emma whispered. “Please try not to think about it. I want you back the way you used to be. I’m so lonely here. No one has any interest in the things I care about. Like you used to. Remember? How we used to hunt bird’s eggs?”
Henrik stared at her, eyes wide with incomprehension. His mouth moved, but no words emerged. He jumped up, strode over to the truck, cranked the engine, and drove out the lane.
EMMA STOOD WITH the rest of the student congregation and joined in singing the closing hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.” (Before the Great War the Hancock College chapel had sung the hymn in Luther’s original words: “Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott,” but no longer.) Like all students at Hancock, Emma was required to attend chapel on Sundays and to take two courses on biblical teachings: New Testament, followed by Old Testament.
Emma had come to love religious music—the college had an excellent chapel choir and the chapel was equipped with a fine organ—and she found the familiar repeated rituals of liturgical worship comforting in ways that she could not have articulated. But the habits of questioning and skeptical seeking for evidence that she was acquiring in her science courses had made it difficult for her to accept the Church’s teachings as the literal truth. Dr. Bauermeister, who as professor of theology and an ordained minister had taught the required Bible courses, had insisted in answer to her questions that the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection were not metaphors, but real historical events that confirmed the uniqueness of Christ as “God on earth” and His mission to rescue humanity from sin.
Dr. Weatherbee had shrugged impatiently. “In my opinion, Emma, the Bible is not a reliable source of information about natural phenomena. We must rely on observation and experiment.”
“But if God created Nature and its laws, couldn’t He break them?”
“Perhaps, but an alternative explanation is that these reported miracles were invented stories, stories made up by a gullible and superstitious people almost two thousand years ago.”
“How can we tell which is the truth?”
“I doubt that we can, dear. I’ve long felt that it was a waste of time trying. Mind you, this is a church-supported college. I try not to bite the hand that feeds me.”
For the moment, though, caught up the surging hymn borne on hundreds of youthful voices and a thundering pipe organ, Emma shivered with pleasure and ignored her doubts—did it even matter whether it was true or not?
As the students filed out of the chapel after the Benediction, Max Swerdt, who had been coming to chapel with Emma for the past few months, leaned close to her and said, “You seemed especially radiant this morning, Emma, filled with the Holy Spirit.”
“Oh, Max, you make me too saintly. I just love the music.”
Max was a senior, son of a Lutheran minister, and planning to follow his father’s path to seminary and the ministry. He had begun paying attention to Emma during the fall of her sophomore year, and they had had a few “dates,” if that’s what they could be called. Emma had little free time, and there was not much to do around the college or in the surrounding town other than some college sporting events and infrequent musical and theatrical performances.
Max did not approve of drinking, dancing, or the picture shows in town. They took walks on shady campus paths. On one of these walks he had embraced her and kissed her very quickly and gently, then walked on in embarrassed silence. Emma had felt none of the strange electricity that she recalled from her episode in the woods with Victor. Max’s wooing—was it wooing?—was not unwelcome. He was tall and blond, attractive in a way that reminded her of Henrik. He was unfailingly courteous and never teased her about her background as a farm girl. He listened politely, but without real interest, to her enthusiastic chatter about biology and her discovery of thieving dung beetles.
“Would you walk with me for a while, Emma?” Max asked.
“OK, we can take the long way to Winston Hall. I have to go to work in the kitchen at eleven thirty.”
After a few minutes Max cleared his throat. “Do you think much about the future?”
“Well, of course. All the time. I’ve got to figure out how I can pay for the next two years of college.”
“Yes, but I mean . . . uh . . . beyond that.”
“Well, my idea was to become a high school biology teacher after I graduate. But I’ve begun to think—daydream, really—about becoming a real scientist, maybe a professor like Dr. Weatherbee. I’d have to go to post-graduate school. I would love to be able to do that. It seems almost beyond my reach, but . . .”
“What about marrying . . . some day?”
“Oh, I don’t see where that fits in. Not yet.” She almost said that she hadn’t met anyone she wanted to marry, but stopped herself. Was Max hinting at his interest in marrying her? Would she consider marrying him?
“Surely you don’t want to spend your life as a spinster? Like Dr. Weatherbee?”<
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“No. I think I’d like to be married someday. Have a family. But wouldn’t a husband expect me to stay home? Give up science?”
“Well, naturally, yes. A wife and mother’s place is in the home. If I were married, it wouldn’t do for a pastor’s wife to . . . well . . . be teaching and working in a laboratory all the time . . . it wouldn’t look right. There are so many duties a pastor’s wife must do for the church. And the home and children to take care of. I don’t think any man would stand for that.”
“Well then, maybe I will never marry after all.” Emma’s words carried a greater tone of anger than she wished. Most men felt as Max did. She didn’t wish to drive him away, but hurt and disappointment clouded his face.
“I just don’t see why it matters that much. I mean, staring in microscopes and dissecting dung beetles.”
“Max,” Emma said hotly. “The man I marry—if I do ever marry—will understand why it matters that much.”
Max raised his eyebrows and turned away. They walked in unhappy silence the rest of the way through the campus to Winston Hall.
“WHAT ON EARTH has happened, Emma? You’re always so cheerful. I’ve never seen you crying before.” Dr. Weatherbee pulled up a lab stool and sat opposite Emma.
“Oh, I’m sorry to be such a crybaby.” Emma sniffled and wiped her face with the back of her hand. Dr. Weatherbee handed her a handkerchief and sat quietly, then gently, very tentatively, patted the back of Emma’s hand.
“Come now. What is it? I’d have thought you’d be especially happy after getting word that your paper has been accepted. I was worried that you would have to go to the Field Museum to look at their beetle collection to rule out those other Copris species, but fortunately they relented when we pointed out that the collection will be unavailable until the new building is opened next year, or whenever it is finally finished.”
“I am happy about that, and I’m so grateful that you helped me with that letter to the editor. I’m . . . I’m . . . being silly, I guess.”
“No. Silly does not describe you. What’s wrong?”
“I was called into the Registrar’s office just now and scolded because I still haven’t paid the balance on my dorm bill. She said that if it isn’t paid at once, my grades for the spring semester will be withheld and I will not be allowed to continue at Hancock. Oh, I don’t know what to do. I haven’t got the money. Even if I gave them every penny I have left, it wouldn’t be enough. And I wouldn’t have anything for train fare to get back home this summer.” Emma’s voice quavered, but she successfully fought back more tears.
“How much is owing, dear?”
“Seventy eight dollars.”
“Well, how about if I lend it to you?”
“Oh, that’s not right. I couldn’t take money from you. Not after all you’ve done for me.”
“Nonsense. You can repay me in the fall when you start your junior year.”
“No, I can’t.” Emma’s tears regained the upper hand. “I won’t be coming back in the fall. I’m going to have to go back to teaching again until I can earn enough to pay my tuition and board. It’ll take me two years. It’s taking me forever to complete my studies. And, Dr. Weatherbee, I’ve begun to dream of graduate study, of getting a Ph.D. and becoming a real scientist . . . like you.”
“As well you should.”
“But I’ll never be able to pay for it. What is it: Three, four more years? How ever did you manage it?”
“Oh, I had the good fortune to be born into a well-off family. My grandfather made his fortune in lumber and iron mining. My education was paid for by my family.”
“Oh.”
“Emma, you are so bright, so gifted. You must continue. Please don’t become discouraged.”
“I’ll try. I’ll just have to take it a year at a time, I guess. The next two years feel like a prison sentence, but I’ll be back.”
“Yes, and I’ll be waiting for you. You’re going to be Dr. Emma Hansen someday, yes, you are.”
CHAPTER 5
1920
CHANGE COMES SLOWLY to small rural towns. Oosterfeld’s Grocery was the same as it had been in the days when Emma lived and worked there four years earlier. The shelves lined with cans and jars, kegs of dried beans, corn meal and oatmeal, warm, dusty air, the creaking wooden floors, the patter of the ceiling fans was welcoming, like returning home—no, better. Piet and Hannah Oosterfeld greeted her, taking her hand in both of theirs, a gesture of unusual warmth for this reserved Dutch couple.
“Emma, you’ve come back to us. The store is closing in five minutes. Can you come upstairs and visit a little?”
“Yes, please, I’d like that.”
Upstairs in the apartment Emma had shared with Piet and Hannah, the three of them followed the usual ritual of asking after one another’s health, news of her family—she omitted her concern about Henrik, who had driven her into town this evening and now sat drinking in a speakeasy off an alley behind the main street—recent events in Stanton Mills, and commenting on the weather and prospects for the year’s crops. The apartment was exactly as Emma remembered it—even the embroidered cloths covering the chair arms and backs were the same—but Piet and Hannah seemed older, grayer, and slow moving. Hannah’s hands trembled slightly, and Piet had gently guided her to a chair.
“Now, tell us about college, dear. Are you happy there?” Hannah asked.
“Oh, yes. I love it. And I’m learning so much. There’s a wonderful biology professor, Dr. Weatherbee, and she helped me to publish my first research paper.”
“Is that something quite special?”
“It is. Dr. Weatherbee has only ever had three students do that. And none were sophomores, but me.”
“That’s wonderful. You must be so excited to be going back in the fall.”
“Ah, that’s the sad part that I need to talk to you about. I can’t go back in the fall.”
“Why ever not?”
“I’m completely out of money. In fact, I’m in debt. I’m going to have to teach again for a couple of years to replenish my savings.” Emma had not intended to blurt out her request so quickly, but it spilled out. “I . . . I wondered if . . . if I can get a teaching position here in Stanton Mills . . . if I could live with you again and work in the store for my board. Like I did in high school. It would help me to build up funds for college so much quicker. Oh, if it’s not . . . if it’s an imposition . . . I understand. I hope you don’t mind my asking.”
“We’d love to have you, and we could use the help. We’re not getting any younger. Do you think you can find a teaching job nearby?”
“I’ll start looking right away. Oh, it would be so good to . . . to . . . be with you again.”
WHEN EMMA SAID good-bye to the Osterfelds and left the store, she suppressed an urge to hug them. No, that would embarrass them. But now she had to persuade Henrik to drive home with her. With the coming of Prohibition this year, Stanton Mills’ taverns had been shut down, but one of them had simply relocated to the rear of Schneider’s hardware store and operated as a speakeasy that could only be entered from a back alley. Henrik had told her to find him there. Emma made her way through the dark alley, littered with trashcans and discarded rubbish, until she found a closed, solid door that she guessed lay behind the hardware store. Muffled sounds of gruff male voices and laughter emerged. She knocked—two beats, two beats, three beats, as Henrik had instructed her. The door opened an inch or two. A rich warm brew of smells greeted her—the sharpness of unwashed male bodies, stale beer, bootleg whiskey, and tobacco smoke.
“Yeah?”
“Is Henrik Hansen here? Please send him out.”
“Who’re you, girlie?”
“I’m his sister.”
The man turned and shouted into the room. “Henrik, there’s a girl here. Says she’s your sister. Sure it ain’t your piece of ass?”
“Long’s it’s not my fuckin’ wife,” an unfamiliar voice called out. Laughter.
After a f
ew minutes Henrik appeared at the door. “Wha’? You wanna go home already? Da night’sh young, Emma.” His voice was slushy, and he avoided her eyes.
“Come, please, Henrik. I need you to drive me home, and you’ve had enough”
“Aw.”
“Please?”
“Oh, all right.” Henrik leaned on Emma and he stumbled twice as they left the alley and tottered toward the Ford. He bent down in front of the vehicle to crank it and the engine backfired. He fell onto his rump in the street. “Christ! Retard da shpark. Like to broke my arm!” He remained sitting in the street.
Emma looked around. Who was witnessing this sad scene? The story would be all over the county.
“Hennie, get in the truck. I’ll crank it myself. And I’m going to drive it home. In your condition, you’ll run us off the road.” Henrik had taught Emma how to drive the truck over the past two summers, although he was the only male in the Hansen family who ever permitted her to do so, and then only infrequently.
“Nah, you can’t drive ’er.”
Emma climbed out of the truck’s seat, roughly pulled Henrik to a standing position by his suspenders, and hissed, “Get up, damn it. Get in the truck. On the right side. Now.”
Fortunately, he complied without a word. It took three tries to get the engine started, but soon she was puttering down the street toward home.
When they left downtown area that was illuminated by streetlamps, she called out, “How do you turn on the headlamps?”
She had never driven at night. Henrik pointed to the switch, then slumped in his seat. The country road was very rough and poorly lit by their feeble headlamps. Even though Emma drove slowly, the truck jerked from side to side as it jounced over ruts and potholes. Henrik groaned with each violent jolt.
About two miles from home, he cried out, “Oh, God, stop. I’m gonna . . . I gotta puke.”
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