Amethyst

by Lauraine Snelling

  Winter in Pennsylvania had not prepared him for weather like this—that was for sure.

  After breakfast he brought in more wood and emptied the slop pail off the back porch. Filling the boiler, a tub, and the big kettles with snow, he hauled them back inside to set on the stove to melt.

  “That should give us plenty of water.” Mrs. Robertson nodded. “Thank you.”

  “We’ll do extra in case we get a break and can take it to the barn.”

  “Mr. Chandler…”

  “I know. I just want to be prepared for when God answers our prayers.”

  She huffed a sigh but said no more about that. She turned to her daughters. “Once you girls have finished the dishes, bring your schoolbooks in here by the stove.”

  “But, Ma, there’s no school now anyway.” Emily’s eyes widened in horror.

  “This way you’ll get ahead. Bring your knitting too. Virginia, you can help with the mending. That basket has plumb gotten away from me. Seems to me that if you have time to get in arguments, you have too much time on your hands.”

  “But Joel’s books are down at the soddy.”

  “You can share yours.”

  Joel looked to his father, who just nodded. Giving Jacob a disgusted look, Joel set aside the piece of wood and knife Mrs. Robertson had given him for Christmas. She’d said Mr. Robertson got a whole lot of pleasure out of carving and perhaps Joel might too. So far he’d made a pile of woodchips.

  When the wind failed to mitigate its howling, Jacob caught himself pacing from the window to the door to the stove and back.

  “You planning on wearing out your boots or the floor first?”

  “Sorry. Guess I know what a caged lion feels like about now. What did Ward do when a blizzard hit?”

  “He always worked on things that needed fixing here at the house. Like that chair leg.” She nodded to one of the chairs that was missing a rung. “I should have warned you.” She laid the shirt she was mending in her lap. “He slept or whittled, or we played games. When the schoolwork is finished, we’ll get out the cards.”

  “I see.” Jacob set the chair up on the table so he could see better. He’d never repaired a chair before, but now was as good a time as any to start. The rung had shattered when someone stood on it to reach something out of the cupboard.

  The saw was down at the barn, as was the plane. He picked up the smallest chunk of wood and started paring it down.

  “Ma, my ears hurt from all that noise.” Ada Mae clapped her hands over her ears.

  “Some people go out of their mind from the howling wind. I read that in one of the books.” Emily glared at her sister, then hissed, “Could be you.”

  “Emily, there’ll be no more of that. You apologize, and you will do the dishes after dinner.”

  “But it’s not my turn.”

  “It is now.”

  Jacob heard her mutter, “You always take Ada Mae’s side,” as she stomped down the hall. He could understand how people went insane if the wind howled like this day after day. The girls’ arguing set his teeth on edge. He’d never lived in a house with this many females in one place. He glanced around the kitchen area. In this small space.

  Lord, please give us a break. Would his and Opal’s children squabble like these girls? Please, Lord, I pray not.

  “Mr. Chandler. Mr. Chandler.”

  Was it the wind or someone calling him?

  Cora Robertson shook his shoulder—hard.

  “What?” Jacob rolled over, instantly awake.

  “The front window blew out. Snow is drifting in.”

  “Gather up whatever you can to cover it. I’ll be right there.” Having slept in his clothes since the last time he stoked the fire, he headed for the kitchen with Joel following behind. In the flickering lamplight, the two-foot drift gleamed white.

  “Put your coat on.” He had to yell over the howl of the wind. The temperature had dropped in the room as if he’d stepped outside.

  Mrs. Robertson, her nightdress and robe billowing around her, dropped the quilt she had brought in and went for her coat and muffler. Her girls were pacing the cabin, uncertain about how to help.

  “Where’s a hammer?”

  “Out in the woodshed with the other tools.”

  “Any nails?”

  “No.”

  His nose and cheeks burned already. The hatchet was on the back porch. He crossed to the back door and tugged. It didn’t move.

  “Is it frozen?” Mrs. Robertson and the girls had returned from the bedrooms with a feather bed and a straw-stuffed pallet. “You won’t make it to the woodshed.”

  “The hatchet’s on the porch.”

  He slammed his shoulder against the door, then kicked along the bottom. Lord, open the door; calm the wind. “Is the fire still burning?” “

  Yes, the snow is sizzling when it hits the stove.”

  He jerked again, and this time the door gave way, almost knocking him off his feet. He flipped his muffler over his face and kicked the snow buildup out of the doorway.

  “Can you see?”

  “Hold the lamp to the window and close the door behind me.” They shut it behind him, leaving him seeing only swirling snow until he saw the glow from the window off to his left. Scooping the snow off the woodbox, he dug out the hatchet and forced his way back into the house. With the door shut again, half the wind howl stayed outside. Mrs. Robertson held the pallet against the window frame.

  “This should work. I sent Joel and the girls back to bed.”

  “Nails, what can I use for nails?” He turned to the woodbox and pulled out a chunk, splitting off narrow pieces. Taking the time to sharpen each one, he finally had several to peg the pad into the window frame.

  The wind pushed against the mattress, but the pegs held.

  “I should do this from the outside.”

  “In the morning. This takes care of the worst.” She stepped back. “Don’t know what I’d have done without you here. Thank you, Lord God, for your providence.”

  “Amen to that.” Jacob added more wood to the fire. “You go on back to bed. I’ll stay out here and keep this roaring.”

  “Dawn isn’t that far away. I’d never sleep now.” She looked toward the window. “I’ll just clean up this snow. Blew the window right out. I’d never have believed it if I didn’t see it with my own eyes.”

  Jacob made a face. “I asked the Lord to give us a break, but this certainly wasn’t what I had in mind.” He rubbed his hand, which hurt like fire.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “How do people endure storms like this?” Amethyst asked with a shiver.

  “The term is blizzard. They come roaring down from the Arctic, and there are no mountains or even trees to stop them. I’ve heard that the high plains, like where we are, get more blizzards than any other place on earth.” Pearl set the stove lids back in place and dusted off her hands.

  Amethyst finished rolling and cutting the cookies while they visited. “Does the snow often cover your windows?”

  “No, only when drifting. Sometimes we’ve had to shovel our way out the door, but usually the porches protect us. That’s why, when Carl built this house, he put the front door to the west and the back door to the east. We’ve never had one storm right after the other like this year.”

  Amethyst sprinkled sugar on the cookies she’d laid in the pan. The letter she’d written to her father still lay on the table by the door. No one had been to town in the three days since Christmas— thanks to the blizzard. With the noise of the storm, she had no idea if the train even made it through.

  Some time later the men came in from the workshop, which was located about a hundred feet from the house. McHenry had gone out to help Carl put together a hutch he was building for the Chateau, as everyone referred to the de Mores home. While much of their furniture came on the train from the East, de Mores had drawn the plans and hired Carl to build the piece over the winter.

  “Good thing I put that building so close to t
he house,” Carl said as he brushed the snow off his coat and hat before hanging them on the pegs along the wall. “Without the rope we still might not have made it back from there.”

  “I’d forgotten how bad the blizzards can be here.” McHenry hung up his things. “Or else thought I was exaggerating when I remembered.”

  Amethyst put the dinner on the table because, as usual, the baby wanted to be fed whenever the others sat down to eat. How did Pearl manage without help? She sat down so Carl could say grace, and as soon as the amen was said, she began passing the bowls. Good thing the cellar was under the house instead of in a separate building so there was plenty of food. What did folks do who weren’t prepared like this house?

  Her already high estimation of Carl went up a notch or two further.

  After the dinner dishes were done and the children napping, Amethyst rinsed the diapers she’d washed and then hung them on the line Carl had strung on the swept-off porch.

  “It’s time to sit down and enjoy a bit of quiet,” Pearl said when Amethyst returned with bright red cheeks and a shiver.

  She hung up her coat and scarf and stamped the snow off her shoes. “The diapers froze about as fast as I hung them up.” She held her hands over the stove and rubbed them together. Her finger ached something fierce from the frostbite that had happened when she collapsed in the snow that day on her way to the boardinghouse.

  “I made tea if that sounds good to you too. Do you take milk or sugar?”

  “I’ve had tea, but I’ve never used milk before. I sweetened things with honey when I could.”

  The two women took their tea into the parlor, where Carl had started a fire in the stove. The tree stood in the window, without candles now, a silent witness to the best Christmas Amethyst could remember. No one got drunk, her father hadn’t been whining, and she knew her mother had celebrated the Savior’s birth with Him and all the angels.

  “Your home is so lovely.” Amethyst smoothed the covering on the horsehair sofa. “What brought you to Medora?”

  “I was running away from my father. He wanted me to marry his bookkeeper, who had five children. But the man was so dull, I left. Actually, I got myself hired as the schoolteacher in a town called Little Missouri, about as far away from Chicago as I could go at the time. My father was not happy.” She rolled her eyes, making Amethyst smile. “He threatened to come out and haul me back, but by then I was living at Dove House, which Ruby Harrison owned, and was teaching school in the room they used for card playing at night. We had some grand times in that big hotel.”

  “Is that the one that burned?”

  “Yes, to the ground. Struck by lightning.” Pearl talked as she poured out the tea and passed a cup to Amethyst.

  “Your father tried to marry you off, and mine ran off any suitors so I would be there to take care of him.”

  “Was he ill?”

  Amethyst thought a moment. “He called it ‘feeling poorly,’ then made a trip to town for the cure to be had at the saloon.”

  “Ah, I see. And your mother died when? You said five years ago?”

  Amethyst nodded. “She was the one who made sure all five of us got at least a grammar school education. She came from a good family, but I never learned much about them. Pa resented her mentioning them much.”

  “Interesting that we have a lot in common, you and I. My mother died when I was twelve, and my father remarried a year later. I only began to really appreciate my stepmother as I grew older and even more so when I ran away. I have a brother, a stepbrother, and a stepsister, none of whom I have seen for going on four years now. I do write to my stepmother to keep up with the news.

  “I had an accident when I was little and was burned—that’s what this scar is.” Pearl touched her neck where her high-collared gown and the lace ruching hid the dark wrinkled scar. “I always thought everyone was looking at that. But now I just cover it as much as I can and forget about it.” She sipped her tea. “I started teaching school once I was graduated from Mrs. Eldrige’s Finishing School. I loved teaching at the settlement house for children who were immigrants or just terribly poor. I was able to give them the ability to read, write, and do their arithmetic so they could grow up and be better off than their parents.”

  “Traveling on the train through Chicago, I thought it looked like a lot of poor people lived there.”

  “The train goes through the worst part. There are lovely parks, and I loved the lake. Lake Michigan is the northern border of Chicago. It’s big enough to seem like the sea.” She reached for the teapot. “More?”

  “Please. I lived on the same farm all my life and thought I would inherit it since my brothers all died.”

  “How sad. So after your mother died, you did most everything?”

  “Pa helped some.” She thought back to the butchering day. Some was almost an exaggeration. Glancing over at the piano, she smiled. “You play so beautifully. Sounded like heaven when everyone sang the other night. My mother taught me to sew. If you have any flannel, I would love to sew a new dress for Carly. I never got to sew for a little girl before, but I used to sew shirts for Joel.”

  “Why, that would be lovely. We’ll look in the sewing room tomorrow.” Pearl poured the last of the tea. “I have a favor to ask.”

  “Of course.”

  “Would you be offended if I shared some of my far too many clothes with you? I know they would have to be altered, but I want you to be warm enough. Between us we could redo them.”

  Amethyst felt a burning at the back of her eyes. “You are already so good to me, but if that would make you happy, I would not be averse to receiving such largess. I am most grateful.”

  “I think we should do tea like this every afternoon. Thank you for all you’ve done to make my life easier here.”

  But I’ve done so little, Amethyst thought as she gathered up the tea things and made sure there were no crumbs on the floor. I don’t have to milk the cow and feed the chickens or anything.

  That evening they gathered around the stove, and Pearl opened a book. “I’m sorry to keep reading from the middle like this, but you are welcome to go back and read the first part if you want.” She found the place where she’d stopped and continued the story of Robinson Crusoe. Carly sat in her father’s lap, and the baby slept in the cradle that rocked gently, thanks to Carl’s foot.

  Amethyst let her knitting fall into her lap as she thought of the years earlier when her mother had snatched a few minutes to read to her. While the words poured beauty through her mind, her heart ached for the woman who had taught her so much. Sometimes, Ma, I miss you so badly I can feel my heart crack. Only her mother had loved her the way a person ought to be loved. But, then, that’s the way we should all love one another. That thought brought her upright, and she picked up the knitting needles again. She wound the yarn between her fingers so the tension was just right, and the knitting needle song accompanied the story. Her father probably needed new stockings by now.

  Feeling someone watching her, she looked up to catch the studied gaze of Jeremiah McHenry. A slight smile creased his cheeks when he saw she was aware of his attention, slow, like he saw something he liked. She ducked her head and dropped a stitch. Pay attention, she ordered herself, ignoring the fact that she never paid attention to her knitting, she just let her fingers do what they knew best. With an effort she kept from touching her hair to make sure it remained properly in place. Good thing her hands were already busy.

  Heat started below her neck and worked its way upward. She glanced up from under her eyelashes. He was still watching her. Don’t you know that’s not polite? She dropped another stitch and had to rip out a good part of a row. She had a hard time paying attention to the story, what with the man across from her and the needles and yarn that had a mind of their own.

  Jeremiah loved to watch a woman knit. How she could manage to knit at the same time as listen to the story was beyond him. He’d seen some women walk along a road, knitting and talking with a companio
n. They never tripped, they laughed in the right places, and whatever they were knitting grew accordingly. Miss O’Shaunasy was probably like that. Not like him, who tripped even when watching carefully. She didn’t have much to say, but when she did speak, her voice had a cadence that pleased the ear. She didn’t laugh much either, but she had chuckled with Carly once, and the sound made him want to make her laugh more. From the bit he’d overheard earlier, he had an idea she’d not had much to laugh about in her life.

  He thought back to life at Fort Bowie and compared it to now. There the sun blazed the moisture out of any living thing, while here a blizzard fought to freeze all living creatures to death. There the hills hid marauding Indians who’d just as soon kill anyone in blue as breathe. Here there were two women bent on providing comfort, entertainment, and good food, instead of lonely soldiers who often drank too much and lived in dread of the next campaign.

  He brought his thoughts back to the room and the warmth both physical and mental, in spite of the storm doing its best to blow them and their houses off the face of the earth.

  He woke sometime during the night to silence. Please, God, let it stay that way. He went back to sleep and woke to the rattling of stove lids and the low murmur of the Heglands talking softly so as not to awaken their guests. Darkness still reigned, but when he scraped the frost off the window, he could see a lightening of the eastern sky and several stars overhead. He heard the back door slam and saw a lantern throwing circles of bouncing light as Carl made his way to the barn. While they’d taken water to the animals yesterday, they’d not been able to let them drink their fill. Today they would. Hard to believe this was the second blizzard since Christmas.