The Homestead

by Linda Byler

  A layer of dust covered everything everywhere. Every blade of grass, every rooftop, every living creature. It lined Hannah’s nostrils, filling her mouth with a powdery taste, and it coated the gunny sack filled with the week’s provisions for her family.

  Every day the sky remained the same hot blue. Every day the sun rose, a huge, orange circle of untamed heat, the light blinding and brassy with the dry, unchanging fiery temperature.

  They said this was common. Summers were always dry. But the grizzled old men wearing their slouched, greasy hats made of leather, the ones who came from Utah, the gold miners and trappers, some of them with slovenly, unkempt Indian women who came to town looking for trades—they all said there’d be a real drought this time, the likes they ain’t seen in many years.

  Fear shot through Hannah’s stomach when she heard it, thinking of the sprouting cattle herd, the two horses, the weak, shallow well. How would anyone survive if there was no rain for years? They’d be forced to move. The cattle would die. Dat would resume his fasting and praying. Hannah shuddered, reached back to touch the sack of food, assuring herself of the next week’s survival.

  She watched the sun. The heat no longer shimmered across the prairie the way it had at midday. She shifted in her saddle and spoke to Pete to move him along. She couldn’t goad him into a trot with the awkward pack on his back, so she’d have to keep him stepping. In the distance the sun had already slid lower in the sky.

  She had a good feeling about the pack, or rather, its contents. The usual flour, sugar, and cornmeal, but this time there was more coffee, tinned milk, canned peas, a round of hard, yellow cheese, and a side of bacon covered in green mold that had been left hanging in the widow Layton’s attic too long.

  Layton had brought it into Harry and wondered if he’d trade it for a few necessities. He said yes, not having the heart to turn her away with that little flock of pale, wide-eyed children. How could he?

  Hannah respected Harry for his choice, respected him even more when he wrapped it in brown butcher’s paper and sent it home with her. As a last-minute kindness, he added a large sack of dried navy beans, so Hannah could hardly wait to present her mother with the beans and bacon.

  She’d carefully cut away the mold, breathless and intent on each slice of her knife, knowing the salted meat would not be spoiled on the inside. She’d soak the beans overnight, add a bit of onion, simmer the soup on the back of the stove all day, and bake fresh bread with so much care, resulting in a meal that would be a spread of pure thanksgiving.

  She came to the crossing where the road turned east, lifted the reins and urged Pete on, now watching the sun with a sense of agitation. Had she started out too late?

  “Come on, Pete. Hurry up.” Pete quickened his steps, his ears coming up and flicking back at the sound of her voice. If only she could made him break into a good, fast gallop she’d soon be home. She thought of loosening the pack and holding it across her lap, but that might be foolhardy with those tin cans flopping and banging around. Perhaps she should have accepted Clay’s offer.

  She urged Pete on again, felt the clapping of the gunny sack against her lags. The trousers were so thick and irritating, being alone and no one to see her riding, she decided to stop Pete and get rid of them. She pulled on the reins, slid off the saddle, and lifted her skirt to work on the buttons with one hand, holding on to Pete’s reins with the other. She could soon tell that wouldn’t work, so she dropped the reins and returned to loosening more buttons.

  She didn’t know old faithful Pete could take off like that. One second he was there; the next he’d dug his hind feet into the hard, dry soil and taken off in a flash, leaving Hannah with the unwieldy trousers half buttoned, standing in the middle of the road and yelling until she was hoarse.

  Then she shed the trousers and began to run. She ran until the sweat rolled down the side of her face and the neckline of her dress was wringing wet. Her breath came in gasps of pain, but still she ran.

  Twilight settled across the immense, level land, cooling the air. Hannah slowed to a walk, shaded her eyes for a sign of Pete, but there was none. He had vanished over the horizon, the gunny sack tied to the empty saddle and flapping wildly. With a sinking feeling, Hannah knew there was not even a slight possibility the sack would stay on.

  There was nothing to do but keep walking and hope the sack would fall off on the road, food intact, so she could carry it home. But what if Pete took a shortcut, traveling straight across the prairie, dropping the sack in high grass where it would never be found?

  That would mean they’d go begging to the Jenkinses again, or she would, since no one else took that task upon themselves.

  She wouldn’t go this time. Absolutely not. She would not go crawling back to Clay after refusing his offer of a ride home.

  She calculated she still had five or six miles to go. Frustrated, she stood in the middle of the road and screamed, stamped her foot, and screamed again. There was no one to hear, no one to care, so why not? Here she stood, carrying the stupid pants that had caused all the trouble to begin with. She wanted to fling them into the tall, dry grass and leave them there.

  With the twilight came the birds’ evening calls, their wheeling across the cooling sky that was still misted with a rose color, the afterglow of the setting sun. The birds’ songs made her feel a bit better, along with the pungent, earthy smell of the dry grass. The flat plains stretched away on every side, the grasses now appearing shadowed, unmoving, an immense expanse of nothing, yet everything. The sky, the air, the earth beneath, the sharp tang of the listless wind; it was everything to Hannah.

  This was her home. A clean, unfettered place that spoke of freedom. The magnificence of being in a world that was so vast, so immense, dwarfed every care, every fussy little worry in her head. Here on the prairie, all the pressure, the tugging on her mind about ordinary things, simply evaporated.

  So she set off with one foot in front of the other, and she walked. Darkness fell, the stars poked their blinking little faces through the dark night canvas of the sky. The moon appeared above her in a thin crescent.

  The darkness deepened. Hannah thought she should be coming up on the creek bottom shortly, or at least be able to see the tops of the cottonwood trees. But still, just dark blobs in a dark world.

  Was she still on the road? She guessed she must be, or else she’d be in tall grass, although this wasn’t much of a road.

  Ahead, a light flickered and went out. Hannah’s breath quickened. Was she close to home? No, they had a chimney now, and a cook stove. It couldn’t be Mam’s cooking fire.

  Hmm … There! There it was again. A fire. But who would build a fire in the middle of all this dry, blowing grass? Surely no one in their right mind.

  Certain now that it was a fire, she moved slowly toward it and saw the hulking figures squatted before a ring of torn away grass with a crackling fire in the center.

  She stopped. To walk up to two strange men in the dark of night would be unwise, that was sure. On the other hand, what if they had found her sack of food and were helping themselves to it, having a hearty meal with the only food that would mean her family’s survival? Well then. She had only one choice, foolish or not.

  She kept walking, then thought better of it and stopped. Perhaps if she got closer and listened to their speech, she could tell whether they were trustworthy or not. Her instinct told her to make a wide turn through the grass and slide silently through it, like a wraith, a ghost. They’d never know anyone had ever crossed their path.

  But the food. What about the food? She hesitated, then began to walk until she was so close she could see the spit with the broiling animal roasting on the fire.

  Two men. Hats like the trappers and gold miners.

  “Hey!” Hannah called.

  They turned toward her voice, their faces shadowed but illuminated on one side by the firelight. Their eyes appeared like slits in their faces, their noses were the only thing visible, protruding from faces cov
ered in dark facial hair.

  “Hey yourself.”

  Hannah stepped forward, the trousers bunched in her hand. “You didn’t come on to a gunny sack filled with food, did you?”

  Slowly, they both got to their feet and turned with their backs to the fire. They appeared completely black now, like menacing ghosts that had stepped straight out of some book her father would never let her read.

  “Wal, what’s comin’ down th’ road? A vision. A angel’s come to visit.”

  “A crown on ‘er haid,” the other one remarked. Their voices were raspy with age and life, but not unkind.

  “I’m Hannah Detweiler. My horse ran off when I was coming home from work. He had a sack tied onto his saddle.”

  “No ma’am. We ain’t seen no horse. But we ain’t been here that long. We is Peter Oomalong and Bradley Hopps. Jest travelers makin’ our way. Some people call us tramps, or hobos, but we ain’t either one. Just folks like other folks, makin’ our way.”

  Hannah stepped past the fire, thanked them properly, and ran like the wind, stumbling over stubbles of dried grass, putting as much distance between them and herself as she possibly could. She calmed herself by walking again, straining her eyes to find the tops of trees, the creek bottom, anything for a sign of home.

  Then suddenly, there it was—a pinprick of light that was the window of the house. She walked slowly now, savoring the new feeling of safety contained in the lighted window.

  She found her family in tears, Mose and Sarah pacing the floor. Pete had returned, riderless, the food intact. The only thing that had gone wrong, the beans had spilled from the paper bag into the gunny sack, but they could be washed and used just the same.

  Sarah held Hannah in her arms, and Hannah did not resist. Mose was reverent in his gratitude. Manny was pale-faced, but as brave as he was able to be. Hannah recounted her story, which left them shaking their heads in bewilderment.

  “It just isn’t like Pete. He’s never done anything like that,” Manny grinned, saying that the thought of Hannah taking off the trousers in the middle of the road must have scared him.

  Sarah said there would be no more riding home from work, ever.

  CHAPTER 14

  The dreadful news of Sarah’s mother’s passing arrived in a letter from her sister. Hod had gone to town, brought back the letter and watched Sarah’s still lovely face crumple and fall, her large dark eyes straining to contain the endless reservoir of tears that would follow. She would have fallen if Hod had not reached out to support her, which is how Mose found his wife weeping in his neighbor’s arms.

  Sarah would not be comforted, her grief like a great swelling of darkness in her body that shut off the light and life around her. Mose led her away from Hod to the armless rocking chair, knelt before her, and dried her tears. He spoke many words of comfort, quoted scripture in soft tones that Sarah failed to hear, so completely was she swallowed by her grief.

  Hod stood, shifting awkwardly, cleared his throat before offering them money for the train fare.

  “Do you want to go, Sarah?”

  Sarah shook her head and whispered that she’d been buried weeks ago. Hod ground his teeth, the muscles in his cheek working. How could this man take his wife to a region such as this with none of their own kinfolk near? Obviously, the Amish were a close-knit group, like birds or animals, one kind stuck to their own. This Hod understood, and as time went on, their existence here, dependent on others, made no sense.

  He sent Abby over with an agate roaster of beef stew and dumplings. Sarah was composed but fragile with the force of her grief. Hod sent Clay with the truck to fetch Hannah, saying the family needed her until Sarah was better, which Clay did, trying to hide the happiness he felt.

  He had a hard time persuading Hannah to go with him. She stood like a statue, her arms crossed, and listened as he spoke of her grandmother’s passing, her face white and resolute, not a tear in her eyes.

  “I’m not going back in the truck. I told you. Before.”

  “Yes, you are. Your mother needs you.”

  “And what if Dat sees me pulling up to the house? Then what?”

  “He ain’t gonna do nothing.”

  “You don’t think?”

  “No. He’s real worried about your Ma.”

  “She’s not my ma. She’s my Mam.”

  Clay didn’t answer. He wanted to smack her the way she was acting, all hoity-toity and holier-than-thou. When he didn’t answer, she didn’t know how to take it, just watched after him when he strode out of the store.

  He went out and sat in the truck, figured he’d wait about a half hour, and if she didn’t get her royal self out, why then he’d just go back home without her.

  Ten minutes passed, then twenty. He was just about to start the motor when she yanked the door of the truck so hard he thought she might pull it off the hinges. Still mad, he warned her not to pull on that door like that. She’d pull it right off.

  “Oh, get over it,” she answered rapidly.

  Clay didn’t say anything, just started the truck, turned the steering wheel and moved out into the street, reached down to shift gears when it was necessary. Keeping one hand on the wheel, he stared straight ahead with a deep scowl on his tanned face.

  Hannah slouched back in the corner of the truck, as far away from Clay as possible, which was still much too close. She had never been able to study him in such close proximity, so she took her time, noticing the way his light hair hung down over the back of his gray shirt collar, the plane of his nose, the set of his jaw, the way his mouth turned down at the corners. He had pockets on his shirt, and wore jeans with a leather belt and a big silver buckle, which was way out of the Amish Ordnung, especially that silver clasp on his belt. Or whatever it was.

  His hands were big, the fingers long and the backs covered in fine blonde hair. When Hannah had finished sizing him up, she crossed her arms and looked out of the window to her right, decided if he wasn’t talking, then she wouldn’t either.

  The truck rattled and bounced over the cracks in the road. The hot wind puffed in through the window as the level land flew past, and nothing was said.

  Finally, Hannah had to know why he was riled, and asked how they found out her grandmother had died.

  “A letter.” And that was all he said the remainder of the trip. Hannah flounced out of the pickup and slammed the door as hard as she had yanked it open, then fled into the house as the truck pulled away.

  Well, be that way then, she thought, before she entered the house to find her mother quietly sitting in the armless rocking chair, holding Abby and weeping with soft little moans into her blanket.

  Hannah stood before her, uncertain. “Mam,” she said softly.

  “Oh, you’re here. They said you were coming. That’s good.” She lowered her head and laid it on top of Abby’s blanket, the tears resuming with soft moaning sounds of devastation.

  Unsure what to do, Hannah remained standing, awkwardly, her arms at her sides, thumbs tucked in her closed fingers, one bare foot propped on the other.

  “Don’t cry, Mam.”

  “I won’t. Not much, anyway,” came the muffled answer.

  So Hannah went to work, trying not to compare this dwelling on the homestead with the one in town. Everything seemed so dull and brown and rough, especially the floor and the walls. She missed the sink and the cupboards and the clean, sanitary bathroom with everything in order. And here, well, this was her home, so she would have to accept it.

  She cooked the simple evening meal of corncakes and beans, glad to see Manny’s surprise when he spied her. The children were quiet, watching their mother’s face as she picked at her food. Mose ate well, with concerned eyes lifting to his wife’s face every minute.

  Hannah decided enough was enough, with that awful, quiet ride home from Pine, and now this. It was like living in a tomb. No one laughed or spoke. The wind rustled the grass and blew in through the window as the children’s spoons clanked against their plates
. Dat cleared his throat or swallowed noisily, liquid sounds that rankled Hannah’s ill humor to begin with.

  Suddenly, she pushed away from the table and said she was going outside. She couldn’t get away from that house fast enough. Blindly she ran, not caring where she went. Eventually, she flopped down on the grass and laid on her back, her breath coming in short, hot puffs. The sky loomed over her, a gigantic lid of heat that would not let her breathe.

  So Mam’s mother had died. She was dead to Mam the day they had left. She knew then that she’d never see her mother again. Or did she? Who could tell, plodding along behind Mose the way she had done. Her father, Mose. What a dreamer! Now, here he was, watching his wife’s face with all that loving worry and concern, which wasn’t worth the effort it took to lift those pious black eyebrows.

  Hannah felt the old resentment rising up. She didn’t care that she ought not to think these negative thoughts. If he could only lay down his self-righteous life and take Mam home to her family, his own life would be free from all of this concern. He knew how she struggled. He knew it. Then why stay here?

  But to go back home would be strange too. They would be not only strangers in their own community, but, perhaps even worse, failures. He’d lost the farm. He’d lost everything. They’d all say that.

  No, this was home. These 320 acres were their homestead, their own proof that they could make it. They could face every adversity, every drought, every storm, every winter, everything. Poverty wouldn’t put them under, either. Poverty was the worst. In life, you needed certain things to survive. You needed food and clothing and money.

  Well, they’d beat poverty too. They would. Somehow. With God’s grace, Dat would say. And yes, she agreed fiercely, with her determination and God’s grace. His byshtant. His standing by.