Until We Reach Home

by Lynn Austin

  "Stop it, Elin," Kirsten said. "We didn't do anything wrong. They'll find out that they've made a big mistake, and they'll let us out of here. You'll see."

  She walked to the cell door and gripped the iron bars, peering out into the murky corridor. She wished she believed her own words.

  ~ia

  ,ofer 7Lr i 7ivo

  "MAMA WOULD TELL us to pray," Sofia said. She had stopped feeling sorry for herself long enough to remember. "God promised He would never leave us or forsake us. He'll send help if we ask Him to."

  "Praying won't do any good," Kirsten said. She stood with her back to Sofia and Elin, her hands clenching the bars of the cell door. "Prayer isn't like walking into a store and picking out what you want to buy. God isn't going to wave a magic wand and goof, we'll live happily ever after."

  "God answered all of my other prayers," Sofia said. "I asked for you and Kirsten to get better and you did. I asked for help when I was all alone on Ellis Island, and He sent Ludwig."

  "I must be doing something wrong, then," Elin said. "I don't think God ever answered any of my prayers."

  "Oh, Elin. That can't be true."

  "I prayed for Mama to get well, and she died. I prayed for Papa to stop being sad and he killed himself. I prayed that Uncle Sven would stop-" She halted, stumbling over her words. "Th-that he would stop fighting with Nils, but that didn't happen, either."

  "I know the Bible says ask and you'll receive," Kirsten said, "but I agree with Elin. I've asked, but I haven't received."

  "Maybe what you're asking for isn't the best thing for you. Maybe-"

  "Maybe we're being punished," Kirsten said.

  Sofia shook her head. "For what?"

  Kirsten didn't reply. Neither did Elin.

  "Well, I think God is answering our prayers," Sofia insisted, "and we just can't see it yet."

  "Sending innocent people to jail seems like a stupid way to answer their prayers," Kirsten muttered.

  "I'm worried about both of you," Sofia said. "You're turning away from God and you won't tell me why. God is here with us, you know. He loves us and-"

  "And this cell door is still locked," Kirsten said, shaking it until it rattled.

  Sofia wondered how she could reassure them, especially when God didn't seem to be answering her prayers to find Ludwig. Sofia didn't want to lose her faith again, but this jail cell was the worst place she'd ever been in her life. She struggled to recall some of the other promises she had read in the Bible, wishing she could comfort her sisters. If only she had her mother's Bible.

  "Jesus was falsely accused, too," she finally said. "He understands how we feel."

  Kirsten gave a short laugh. "You're not helping me feel better, Sofia. Jesus' accusers killed Him, remember?"

  "Yes, but He died for all of the wrong things we've done. He didn't have to die. You both keep saying that we're being punished for something, but even if that were true, God wouldn't want to punish us. He wants to forgive us."

  Sofia waited for her sisters' response, but neither of them spoke. Kirsten still had her back turned. She saw Elin quickly wipe away a tear.

  "What if we don't deserve forgiveness?" Elin asked.

  "Nobody deserves it. God gives it to us for free, like a gift when it isn't even our birthday."

  The door that led out to the police station opened, and the warden appeared. Sofia whispered a quick prayer. Please, Jesus. Please let him be coming to unlock the door and set us free. Instead, he yelled out something in English that she couldn't understand, and a minute later, the lights went out. Sofia crawled onto one of the cots and pulled the thin blanket around her shoulders. It took her a long time to fall asleep.

  None of them felt like eating breakfast the next morning. The porridge was runny, the toast dry, and the stewed prunes tough and leathery.

  "What are we going to do?" Kirsten asked again. None of them knew the answer. Sofia wanted to remind them again to pray, but her suggestion had met with disbelief last night.

  "They'll have to let us go eventually," she said. "They can't prove we took Mrs. Anderson's things."

  "Well, we can't prove that we didn't take them," Elin said. "Who else went into her bedroom besides us?"

  "Mrs. Olafson brought her breakfast tray every morning," Kirsten said.

  "You think Mrs. Olafson is the thief?" Sofia asked. "You must be joking."

  "Accusing her is no more outrageous than accusing us."

  The morning dragged endlessly. Sofia tried to pray instead of worry-an impossible task. She wondered if she would ever see Ludwig Schneider again.

  Shortly before noon, the warden stopped in front of their door and stuck a key in the lock. He waved them forward as he swung open the cell door. Sofia slid off the cot. She wanted to tell her sisters that maybe this was an answer to her prayers, but she decided to wait and see.

  Please, Jesus ...

  The warden led them out into the main area of the police station, where a gray-haired man in a three-piece suit stood waiting for them. Sofia thought she recognized him from somewhere-had he called on Mrs. Anderson? Had she seen him at church or at the engagement party where she'd sung? Then she remembered.

  "You're Mrs. Anderson's lawyer, aren't you? You came to see her at the mansion."

  "That's correct. My name is John Olson."

  "We didn't steal anything, Mr. Olson. Please, you have to believe us."

  He held up his hand. "Give me one moment, please." He spoke to the police captain in English, too rapidly for Sofia to understand. She slipped her hand into Elin's while they waited, trying not to worry. Mr. Olson handed a piece of paper to the police captain, then bent to sign a paper that the captain handed to him. When he straightened up again, he smiled faintly at the three of them.

  "Come with me, please."

  Miraculously, they were allowed to leave the station. Sofia was surprised to find a bright, warm day outside after the dreary jail cell and the pouring rain during yesterday's funeral. She skirted around puddles as they walked down the block to Mr. Olson's carriage. He opened the door.

  "After you, please, ladies." He gestured for them to climb in.

  Amazingly, Elin didn't object. She was usually so suspicious of strangers. But she seemed too numb to argue, ducking through the door into the covered carriage as if sleepwalking.

  "Are we really free to leave?" Kirsten asked. "We're not just out on bail or something, are we?"

  "All of the charges have been dropped," Mr. Olson said. "I'm very sorry for the mix-up-and that you had to endure a night in jail."

  "Did they find the missing jewelry?"

  "In a roundabout way." He climbed in behind them and signaled to the driver. The carriage jolted forward and merged into the stream of traffic.

  "Silvia Anderson entrusted me with several pieces of jewelry before she passed away," Mr. Olson told them. "She asked me to sell them for her. I have shown her son and the police a copy of the receipts. All of the missing items have been accounted for, and the money is on deposit in her bank account."

  "Thank God," Sofia breathed.

  "Mrs. Anderson also dictated the terms of her will to me, stating several bequests that she wished to make with the funds. I read the will to her family this morning-which is how I learned that you'd been accused of theft."

  "They owe us an apology," Kirsten said. Elfin shushed her.

  "Mrs. Anderson's daughter-in-law intends to contest the will, however. She feels that the jewelry rightfully belonged to her and therefore the proceeds are hers, as well. It will be up to a judge to decide what happens to the money."

  "So we're free to go?" Elfin asked.

  "Yes. Once again, I am very sorry for the misunderstanding."

  "Where are you taking us now?" Kirsten asked.

  "Back to the mansion. I have been asked to supervise while you gather your belongings."

  "I hope Bettina Anderson is there," Kirsten said. "The very least she owes us is an apology after calling us thieves and making us
spend the night in jail."

  "That's not likely to happen." Again, Mr. Olson smiled faintly. "But Mr. Anderson did ask me to give you your final week's pay." He handed Elfin an envelope with twelve dollars in it.

  When they arrived at the mansion, Mr. Olson unlocked the front door and followed them upstairs to the third floor. Sofia had forgotten what a mess the police had made of their room after ransacking it. The entire contents of their trunk had been emptied and searched, then left in a heap. Sofia quickly examined Ludwig's violin, grateful that the police hadn't damaged it. She pitched in to help her sisters refold their bedding. When everything was packed, she gripped one of the trunk's handles to help Kirsten drag it downstairs.

  "No, let's use the main stairs," Kirsten said when Sofia started toward the servants' stairwell. "It'll be easier. And we deserve a little consideration."

  Sofia paused to change hands as they passed through the ballroom, remembering the night that Mrs. Anderson had danced with her son. She had truly seemed like a fairy queen that night, floating across the dance floor in the moonlight. Sofia remembered her kindness in loaning her the cameo pin and recalled the last conversation she'd had with Mrs. Anderson in the carriage. "You've seen through my flapping wings and honking noise," she'd said. Sofia wiped a tear.

  "I'm going to miss her," she said with a sigh.

  "Why does life have to be so hard?" Kirsten asked.

  The driver helped them lash the trunk to the back of the carriage. "Where would you like to go?" Mr. Olson asked.

  "Our aunt's boardinghouse, I guess," Elin said.

  "Wait!" Sofia suddenly cried as the carriage began to move. "What happened to Mrs. Anderson's cat? I didn't see him just now, did you? We promised we would take care of him."

  "I have no idea," Mr. Olson replied. "Everything in the house belongs to her son now."

  Sofia was devastated to think they had broken their promise. She struggled to hold back her tears. "She really loved that cat...."

  "Maybe Mrs. Olafson knows what happened to him," Elin said. "We'll walk over to her house tomorrow and ask her. I know where she lives."

  "Why are you so worried about a cat?" Kirsten asked. "We don't have a place to live, either."

  Aunt Hilma was even less pleased to see them this time than she'd been the first time they had arrived on her doorstep. "What are you doing here?" she asked. "The news is all over the community that you were sent to jail."

  "They found out what really happened to the jewels," Elin told her. "They know we didn't steal them, so they let us go."

  "Disgraceful," Hilma muttered.

  "We were cleared of any wrongdoing," Kirsten said angrily. "We didn't steal anything!"

  "Well, I'm sorry, but you can't stay here."

  "Where are we supposed to go?" Elin asked.

  "You should have accepted those young men's offers in the first place and gone to Wisconsin. You would have had homes of your own by now. I suppose you can stay the night, but I want you to find someplace else to live as quickly as you can and be gone."

  By the time Sofia helped Kirsten drag the trunk upstairs, she was exhausted. She and her sisters sat looking at each other.

  "Now what?" Kirsten asked.

  Elfin shook her head. "I'm so sorry," she said softly. "We never should have left home."

  ~2Qpfer 7L !y 762ree

  PASTOR JOHNSON AGREED to meet with Elfin and her sisters the next morning in his study. She felt like a penitent on judgment Day as she stood before him once again, pleading for work. The minister sat behind his desk with his hands folded, looking up at them, but since there were only two visitors' chairs, Elfin and her sisters remained standing. She wished Uncle Lars had come with them again, but their uncle seemed to be avoiding them, as if he was as eager to be rid of them as Aunt Hilma was.

  "You helped us find work before, Pastor Johnson, and we're very thankful," Elfin began. "But now that Mrs. Anderson has passed away, we wondered if you knew of anyone else who needed maidservants."

  "I'm not aware of anyone." He seemed surprised that they would ask him, as if he didn't recall helping them once before.

  "The three of us don't have to work together in the same place," she said quickly, "although we would prefer it."

  "And I can speak a little English, now," Sofia added. "It wouldn't have to be with a Swedish family."

  "And it would help if the job included room and board," Kirsten said. "Aunt Hilma doesn't want us, even though we're her own flesh and blood."

  Elfin laid her hand on Kirsten's arm to shush her, afraid that the pastor would think less of them for complaining about their aunt. He looked at the three of them with pity. His eyes were the same shade of gray as his tousled hair.

  "I would like to help you ... really I would. But I'm afraid that finding a job for any of you is going to be very difficult, if not impossible. Domestic servants are usually hired by word-of-mouth-the same way that gossip spreads. Unfortunately, everyone in our church community has heard the gossip about Silvia Anderson's jewelry. The stigma of theft will likely follow you."

  "But we're innocent!" Kirsten said. "We didn't steal anything!"

  "I know. But Bettina Anderson doesn't see it that way. Her motherin-law named the three of you as beneficiaries in her will-"

  "She did?" Elin said. "She named us? Her lawyer didn't tell us that."

  "Well, it seems she did, and so Bettina still feels that you have stolen from her in a sense. She is going to make things very difficult for you, I'm afraid."

  "That's not a very Christian way to act," Sofia said. "How can she attend church every Sunday and then turn around and treat people that way?"

  "Very few of us act the way Jesus would like us to, Miss Carlson. I can preach the truth, but I can't enforce it. God gave everyone a free will."

  "Tell her she can keep all of the money," Elin said. "We don't want it, if that's the way she feels. We just need jobs and a place to live."

  "I don't know what else I can do for you," he said, lifting empty hands. "Chicago is filled with new immigrants looking for work. It's challenging enough for a man to find a good-paying job and a place to live, but it's especially difficult for young, unmarried women to find housing and the means to support themselves."

  Something in the way he emphasized unmarried made Elin wonder if he knew about their refusal to marry the young men in Wisconsin. She could well imagine Aunt Hilma telling the pastor's wife and everyone else how she and Lars had done their best for their ungrateful nieces, but they'd scorned her help.

  "You may have to go outside our Swedish community for work," Pastor Johnson continued. "Chicago is a big city, and if you can speak a little English it will certainly help."

  "We don't know how to find a job," Kirsten said. "That's why we came to you."

  "I'm sorry, but I'm not in the business of helping people find work. I have enough to do shepherding this flock." He rose to his feet and began sidling toward the door as he spoke, as if eager to show them the way out. "But I'll try to think of someone else who can advise you."

  "I don't believe him," Kirsten said when they were outside in the bright sunshine again. "He isn't going to find someone to help us. His loyalties lie with Bettina Anderson. She probably donates money to his church."

  "Our own family isn't helping us," Elfin said, "so why should he?"

  "Now what?" Sofia asked.

  Elfin had awakened long before dawn that morning, asking herself the same question as she'd stared into the darkness. She could think of only one other person who might be able to help them.

  "Let's go talk to Mrs. Olafson. She needs to find a new job, too. Maybe she can help us."

  "Ha! I wouldn't be surprised if she turned against us, too," Kirsten grumbled as they started walking away from the church. "I'm beginning to see that the community here is just like our village back home-taking sides, spreading gossip and lies ..."

  "Then let's not do the same thing," Sofia said. "Let's try to see people the way they
really are from now on, not colored by what others say about them. Remember all the bad things everyone said about Mrs. Anderson? But once we got to know her, she wasn't so terrible after all."

  They halted at the street corner, waiting for the traffic to clear before crossing. "Do you really think she left us some money in her will?" Kirsten asked. "I wonder why her lawyer didn't mention it to us."

  "Probably because he didn't want us to get our hopes up," Elfin said. "It turned out he was right not to mention it."

  "How much money do you suppose she left us?" Kirsten asked. They were passing a storefront with dresses and hats on display, and Elin noticed that Kirsten's steps had slowed as she gazed through the window.

  Sofia tugged on her arm, pulling her forward again. "It doesn't matter," she said. "We'll never see a penny of it."

  They walked another full block with the hot summer sun blazing down on them like a stove on a winter day. "Where does Mrs. Olafson live?" Kirsten asked as she mopped her brow with a handkerchief.

  "She has an apartment above the Swedish bakery."

  Elfin found the bakery easily enough, but it took a few minutes to find the apartment's entrance in the rear of the building. The aroma of fresh bread filled the stairwell, bringing tears to Elin's eyes. The longing she felt wasn't for homemade bread, but for a home.

  "I couldn't live here," Kirsten said, inhaling deeply. "This smell would make me hungry all the time."

  "Maybe you'd get used to it," Sofia said.

  Elfin knocked on the apartment door, and when it opened, there was Mrs. Anderson's cat, circling Mrs. Olafson's feet, rubbing his flattened head against her legs.

  "Tomte!" Sofia cried.

  "We were so worried about you," Elfin said as she crouched to pet him. The huge cat began to purr from all their attention, rumbling like a landslide. "We didn't know what happened to him."

  "Ja, the poor thing mourned terribly after she died," Mrs. Olafson said. "The other Mrs. Anderson ordered the gardener to tie him up in a burlap sack and toss him into the river. Well, I couldn't let that happen, so here he is."