The Reaper's Song

by Lauraine Snelling

  She shook her head at her worrisome thoughts. Thorliff had been doing men’s work since he’d started school or before. As soon as his hands were big enough to squeeze the teats, he’d been milking cows.

  “Andrew’s hungry,” Ellie announced, as if delivering a message from the president himself.

  Another groan came from the bedroom.

  Ingeborg turned and nearly ran over Baptiste. She clapped a hand to her bosom. “Heavens, boy, you nearly scared me out of my wits. How about telling me when you come in?”

  Baptiste smiled his slow smile, his black eyes twinkling. “I come like Grandmere.”

  “I know. She does the same thing to me.” Ingeborg laid a hand on his shoulder. He was as tall as she now, with Thorliff not far behind. “You boys are growing so fast.”

  “That is good, yes?” His smile, once so elusive and now always at the ready with those he called family, made her smile in return. “Ja, that is good.”

  “The milking is done and the pans set for skimming. Tante Kaaren says she is going to churn butter today. Lars said we would go to the Baards’ as soon as chores were done.”

  “Breakfast will be ready in just a few minutes. You go wash.”

  Harvesting would begin today, and Haakan lay trapped in bed. Ingeborg sent a prayer heavenward. Perhaps he was too sick to care.

  But as soon as she entered the sickroom again, she knew that was not the case. He squinted from eyes sunken from the fever. “Are they gone?” he croaked, the fever drinking up all the liquids she tried to pour into him and rasping his throat.

  “Soon.” She held his head while he drank from the cup, his hands shaking so the cup clattered against his teeth. “You want more pillows?”

  “No. Flat is best.”

  “You need a wash? Cool water would feel good.”

  “Not if I have to move.”

  She laid a hand on his forehead. “Uff da.” She studied him for a moment. “How about if I soak towels and just lay them across you?” What she would give for ice right now. “If we could move you to the springhouse . . .”

  He shook his head. Goodie stopped in the doorway. “Any better this morning?”

  “Ma, Andrew is hungry.” Ellie pulled on her mother’s apron. “You know, child, if you took as good a care of those chickens as you do Andrew . . .”

  “I’ll feed them later.”

  “The food is all ready if you would just put things on the table. Thorliff took a telegram to Grafton to the doctor. He’s to wait for a reply.” Between her two sick ones, Ingeborg felt like the rope in a tug of war.

  “I’d be willing to bet the doctor is going to say ‘Keep the man comfortable until the body heals itself.’ ” She turned to look at Haakan. “Best thing for you might be that rotgut whiskey over to Anner’s. You drink enough of that, and I can guarantee you’ll be singing a different song.”

  “I hate even having the stuff in the house,” Ingeborg said. Memories of long Norwegian winter nights and a father who figured vodka was the best antidote to dispel the gloom pulled Ingeborg’s mouth down at the corners. More than once he’d been passed out on the floor when she and the other children came down in the morning. No one was surprised when he wound up frozen in a snowbank one night. But surprised or not, the hurt never did leave.

  “Don’t matter. If’n it could help him through this. . . .”

  Ingeborg nodded. “Anything that would help.”

  “I’ll send Hans on over, then.”

  Ingeborg could hear the others in the kitchen as she dipped cloths in cool water and laid them across Haakan’s body. By the time she reached his feet, those on his face were already dry.

  “If only we could let you float in the cow’s water tank.”

  Haakan barely moved his head, but the nod said he agreed.

  When Thorliff returned just before noon, he carried two messages. The one from the doctor said do anything to keep the man comfortable and let the disease run its course. A firm truss was helpful and cold, wet cloths.

  Ingeborg just shrugged her shoulders at Goodie’s I-told-you-so look.

  The other message was the one that caused a stir. “Tomorrow!” Ingeborg looked up, her mouth open. “Bridget and the others are arriving tomorrow. I forgot all about them.” She looked again at the telegram in her hand. “She says she has four others. I thought she was bringing Onkel Hamre’s grandson and Katja, the youngest daughter. Oh, and Sarah Neswig. Who is the fourth?”

  “You’ll know tomorrow. Not to worry about room for everyone. They can have the beds in the main room of the soddy. Me and mine and the boy will sleep in the lean-to. I’ll turn the beds all out next. Them beans can wait an hour or two.” A bushel basket of beans ready to snap sat upon the countertop.

  “No, Andrew and Ellie can snap the beans,” Goodie continued.

  “That ought to keep him quiet for a while. Thank God children recover so quickly.”

  “He’ll probably eat half of what he snaps. I never saw a child that can eat like he can. Even right after he woke up from sleeping for two days after landing on his head.” Ingeborg shook her head, but the light in her eyes showed her pride in the youngster.

  Ingeborg glanced around her kitchen. She had planned on a thorough housecleaning before Bridget came, and now that was impossible. Beans to can, a very sick man needing plenty of attention, harvest starting, and Andrew . . . thank God for Andrew’s coming out of the sleep. If she thought on that, maybe she wouldn’t worry so much about the other things.

  “Why don’t you go on over to Kaaren’s with the telegram and let me put the beans we got done to cooking? Once I get the beds put back together, the soddy is ready. Baptiste can beat the blankets and rug for me. I’ll turn the ticking. Couple more days and we coulda put in fresh straw. Now that woulda been fine.”

  Ingeborg let the words roll over her. Goodie was a talker, that was for certain. But the heart that beat within her breast was as big as the Dakota skies and twice as generous. Ingeborg would miss her and her two children when they moved to their new home after her marriage to Olaf. And this Saturday was the house-raising too.

  “Ja, I think I will do that.” She peeked in the door of the sickroom. Haakan lay on his back, eyes closed, and breathing in the regular way of real sleep. Might be that the laudanum she’d mixed with his cooled dinner coffee was doing its work. “If he calls, or Astrid wakes up, send one of the boys to get me.”

  “We’ll see.”

  While it had been hot in the house, the direct sun beating down brought sweat to her brow immediately. She fanned herself with her handkerchief, thinking how nice a grove of shade trees would be between the two houses. Stacks of lumber from last winter’s cutting lay drying in the sun in preparation for building a frame house for Kaaren and Lars. They would put it up after harvest.

  Before harvest, after harvest, there was never time enough for all that needed doing. Winter would be on them far before they were ready for it. She shook her head at the crazy way her thoughts skittered around. Here she was dripping sweat on an August afternoon and thinking about winter being right around the corner.

  “Heavenly Father, you must think us such silly creatures, always worrying about tomorrow and letting today slip by.” She stopped to admire a black-eyed Susan blooming along the fence of the pasture that separated the two houses. If the cows or horses had been pastured there recently, they’d have leaned through the fence to gobble the flower. No matter that they had plenty of grass inside the fence. “We people aren’t too different from the cows, are we? Never content with what we have, always leaning through the fence in search of more. And, Father, right now my more is for you to please bring healing to Haakan’s poor body. He is so sick, and I ask that you help him to endure this trial. He and sick don’t get on well, as you know. Thanks for listening.”

  She shaded her eyes with her hand to see the two binders cutting and bundling the wheat over at the Baards’. She should have been over there helping Agnes cook for the crew o
r at least should have sent Goodie over. Since Trygve had been running a fever and coughing, Kaaren hadn’t gone either.

  Tomorrow she’d have to take the team and wagon into town to meet the train. That thought put wings to her feet. Kaaren didn’t even know her first mother-in-law would be arriving that soon. Some sister-in-law she was. Or were they still sisters-in-law since the husbands that were brothers were gone?

  She tapped softly on the frame of the screen door to the northern soddy. This was naptime for the children, and Sophie woke so easily. Going full tilt until sleep side-whacked her, Sophie only slowed down to take care of her sister, Grace. And to tell her, in the twins’ own indecipherable way of communicating, what someone had said.

  “Come in, come in. What are you waiting for?” Kaaren whispered as she opened the screen door.

  “Why don’t you come out here and we can sit in the shade? We may be able to catch a breeze there.”

  Kaaren nodded and slipped out the door. “I just got Trygve and the girls to sleep, so we should have an hour or so of peace.” She wiped her forehead with the corner of her apron. “Three in diapers keeps that boiler going all the time it seems. Between the washing and the canning . . .” She shook her head. “I’m not complaining, you understand?”

  “I know, and I should have sent Goodie over.” The two moved the washbasins from the bench and sank down in the relative coolness.

  “It’s not like you have nothing to do. How is Haakan? Lars said he’d rather have had us cut off his foot than go through what is happening to Haakan.”

  “Ja, but at the time he wouldn’t have thought so.” The two shared a smile. Saving Lars’s foot that had become infected after frostbite had been one of God’s many miracles, and they all believed that to the depths of their marrow.

  “I guess it takes a man to appreciate how Haakan feels.” “Humph. We do the birthing, remember?”

  “Ja, but then we have something wonderful to look forward to. I’d go through anything to hold a new baby in my arms.” Kaaren fanned herself with her apron.

  “Trygve don’t cuddle well, does he?” Ingeborg smiled at the thought of her busy young nephew. He and Astrid were definitely cut from the same cloth.

  “He wants to walk so bad he sits on the floor and screams when the girls leave him.”

  “Sounds like men everywhere.”

  “Ingeborg Bjorklund, what has got into you today?” Kaaren gave her friend a dig in the ribs with her elbow.

  “What has got into me is this telegram.” She held it out for Kaaren to read.

  Kaaren reached for the folded paper, then drew back her hand. “It’s not bad news, is it?”

  “Not unless you think having Bridget and her brood arrive tomorrow is bad news.”

  “How wonderful!” Kaaren paused. “Isn’t it?”

  “Ja. They must have got an earlier ship. Last time we heard, it was for next week.” Ingeborg clucked her tongue. “It’s just with Haakan so sick . . .”

  “So Bridget is a good nurse. And I’ll have no trouble putting Katja to work. But you mark my words, she’ll be the belle of the ball around here. If she’s turned out as pretty as I always thought she’d be, the men will be around her like bees on a blossom.”

  “Besides Katja and Sarah, they’ve brought someone else too, but no mention of her name. Young Hamre will fit right in with Thorliff and the boys. You know, I been thinking, maybe Sarah could go on over and help George and Solveig.”

  “What a great idea! I can’t wait to hear all the news. Letters are wonderful, but they just don’t say enough. I want to know how Far and Mor really are. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they came too?” Kaaren wore the dreamy look that told Ingeborg this wasn’t just a passing fancy. Kaaren had been wanting to see her mother and father again, just like so many of the young people who came over.

  “Someday maybe they will.”

  A cloud darkened Kaaren’s sky blue eyes. “I don’t think so. All of the rest of the family is still there.” She slapped her hands on her knees. “No time for wishful thinking, not when we have so much to be thankful for right now. Bridget will take over the hearts of the little ones before we’ve seen two milkings.”

  “And have three pairs of socks, a sweater, and both mittens and gloves knit by nightfall.”

  “Inge!” The two looked at each other and laughed. “She is rather capable, isn’t she?” Kaaren chuckled again.

  “A paragon. She puts the woman of Proverbs 31 to shame.” Ingeborg shook her head. That wasn’t nice, she could hear her own mother’s voice say in her ear. “I just wish I got as much done in a day as she does. Is my face turning green?”

  “No. You’re not that jealous. You think she’s learned any English?”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised.” Ingeborg got to her feet. She blinked as her world tipped a bit and put a hand against the sod wall to steady herself.

  “Are you all right?”

  Ingeborg nodded. “Just confirms what I’ve been suspecting. I felt like throwing up this morning. Frying the bacon did it.”

  “You just sit yourself down there and rest for another moment or two. Take ten if you need them. I’ll get a dipper of water.” Kaaren took Ingeborg firmly by the shoulders and sat her back down. “How wonderful. Now you can give Haakan that son you been hankering after.”

  Ingeborg let herself be fussed over. How good it felt, even for the moment, to let someone else take charge. She watched a prairie hawk drifting on the air above them. His wild screeching cry brought a thrill to her heart. How free he was. How beautiful with the sun parting his wing feathers with gold. The cry came again.

  If she were free like that, she’d go hunting. It had been so long since she donned men’s britches, taken the rifle, and headed for the game trails. Or she would take the team out, hitched to the plow, and go busting sod. In her mind she could taste the rich aroma of a newly turned furrow. The black earth of the Red River Valley had a fragrance all its own, one that promised riches if one were willing to work hard and long enough to harvest. And rich they were.

  “Here.” Kaaren thrust the dipper of cold water into her hands. “What were you thinking of with that smile on your face?”

  Ingeborg shrugged. “Nothing much.” Kaaren still disapproved of Ingeborg’s wearing men’s britches and of her hunting, in spite of the fact that Ingeborg had kept them alive and the land together with the use of them. Riding the plow was so much easier than fighting to keep the blade of the walking plow running straight and digging just deep enough to cut the sod and roll it over.

  She drained the dipper and handed it back. “Mange takk.” A child’s whimper came from within the soddy.

  “Oh, Sophie, couldn’t you sleep just a bit longer?” Shaking her head, Kaaren turned back to the house. “You sit here and rest. I’ll see if I can get her out of there before she wakes the others.”

  Ingeborg let her thoughts wander back to the fields again. With all the men tied up in the harvest, no one would be breaking sod or backsetting it either. Once the men were on the road with the threshing machine, she could go out a few times. Haakan need not know. At least not until he saw the turned sod. The thought made her heart leap. With Bridget caring for the children, surely no one would mind.

  She sat up straighter and glanced up at the hawk. She caught sight of him, wings pinned to his side as he dove for the earth. Within seconds he flapped his mighty wings again and rose, a gopher dangling from his talons.

  If the hawk could do as he pleased, so could she. Both of them were doing their best to provide for themselves and their families.

  Sophie rode her mother’s hip, her cheek, pink from sleep, rested against her mother’s encircling arm. “Tante Inge.” She smiled and reached out her arms. “Andoo come?”

  “Sorry.” Ingeborg took the child and settled her on her lap. “But Andrew is better.”

  “Andoo owie?”

  “Ja, but Jesus made him better.”

  “Good Jesus.” Sophie’s r
inglets bounced as she nodded her head for emphasis.

  “Truer words . . .” Ingeborg hugged the little girl and kissed her on the tip of her turned-up nose. “You are one smart cookie.” “Cookie?”

  “Now you’ve done it.” Kaaren rolled her eyes.

  “How about if I take her home with me? She can play with Astrid if she’s awake and the others can sleep.”

  “If you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all. Come on, turnip nose.” Ingeborg tweaked the little nose. Sophie giggled.

  “More.”

  Ingeborg tweaked the bit of a nose again and set the child down. “Come on, let’s go see Astrid.”

  “Andoo.”

  “Ja, him too.” She shook her head. “Stubborn Norwegians. Can’t change their minds even when they’re barely able to walk. Mange takk for the drink and the visit. Don’t say anything about the . . . the you know. I’d like to tell Haakan myself.” She glanced down at the child studying her with wide blue eyes and back up at Kaaren.

  “I won’t.” Kaaren knelt by her daughter. “You be good now for Tante Ingeborg.”

  Sophie nodded. “Good. See Andoo.”

  “Bye.” Kaaren waved as the two started off. “No sticks, leaves, flowers, or bugs, Inge, you hear?”

  Ingeborg waved back and reminded Sophie to wave too. Since the twins weren’t ready to be weaned after Trygve was born, she had nursed them. Now, both of the girls treated her like a second mother. And while Grace had been the one needing it longer, Sophie seemed to have developed a special kinship with her aunt.

  Setting Ellie and Andrew to playing with Sophie in the fenced plot in the shade of the house, Ingeborg pumped water into a basin and took it into the sickroom. Two long days now her husband had been like this. How else could she help him?

  Haakan blinked and tried to smile, but the swelling made even that simple task an effort. “I hear you brought company?” The sound made her throat hurt in sympathy.

  “Ja, and some good news also.” She took the telegram out of her apron pocket and read it to him.

  Haakan groaned. “Some way to greet company.” He sighed. “What a mess.”