“You know something, Tante Ingeborg?” Sophie turned her face slightly. “I think everyone is going to remember this day. Years from now people will say, ‘You remember that Fourth of July party we had here in 1905? Never seen another one like it.’”
“I think you are right.” Lord, it sure would be dandy if this is the way the rest of the year goes. She smoothed Inga’s hair again, then felt the child’s face. Sure enough, she was running a fever.
They all started at the sound of a shot in the distance, rapidly followed by another and another.
“Don’t worry, folks,” a man called. “That’s only firecrackers.”
Chapter 16
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
But I don’t want to leave Chicago.
Miriam Hastings stared at the School of Nursing supervisor. Surely there was some mistake. All she ever wanted was to be a nurse right here in this hospital, where women and children could receive the help they so sorely needed.
“Is there a problem with your assignment? You said you understood that you might be sent out to other locations for practical training.” Mrs. Korsheski looked over her round, wire spectacles. “You’ve done so well that I am grateful we can send you to the brand-new hospital in Blessing, North Dakota. Since it is a small hospital, at least compared to this one, you will be able to learn far more. Dr. Astrid Bjorklund is a protégée of Dr. Morganstein. The hospital there is actually a distant arm of our program. You three will be the first of our student nurses to serve there.”
Miriam clamped her teeth together to keep the words she wanted to say from spilling out. How could she leave her family? The little money she earned was sometimes all that bought food for six other hungry mouths. She usually ate in the hospital cafeteria so she needn’t eat at home, the few times she was allowed to leave the premises. The nurses in training were all housed right there with one day off a week.
Miriam cleared her throat. “Have you told the others yet?”
“No. You are the first.”
“I see.” She could feel the head nurse’s eyes drilling right through her starched nurse’s cap and into her head. Say something! the voice inside her ordered and pleaded. You can’t lose out on this chance. But then, What if you are released from the program for insubordination? Then what will happen to your family? She tried to speak, but the words refused to come.
Mrs. Korsheski studied her, then leaned forward. “Miriam, what is it? I was so sure you’d be overjoyed at an opportunity like this.”
Miriam slowly shook her head, forcing the words out. “I am honored that you feel you can trust me with this opportunity, but . . .”
“It’s your family, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” Too broken to be anything but honest, Miriam spoke to her fists clenched in her lap. “They . . . they need every penny I can send to them.” Most student nurses did not receive any pay, instead paying for their schooling, but Miriam did extra work to earn money to send home.
“I see.” Mrs. Korsheski sat back in her chair. “There has to be a way for us to deal with this. Tell me about your family again. I know I have notes written in your file, but refresh my memory.”
“My mother has a chronic illness, so she is weak much of the time. She became a seamstress, and that has pretty much become the family business. I am the eldest of six. A brother of sixteen works anywhere he can find work; my fifteen-year-old sister both sews and has assumed the care of our mother; my brother, who is fourteen, picks up what jobs he can and helps at home; my ten-year-old sister has dropped out of school so she can help with most of the cooking and cleaning; and our youngest sister, who is eight, is still in school. Mother insists that her children have as much education as possible, so she teaches those at home when she can.”
“And your father?”
“He was killed in a strike several years ago. That one wasn’t as bad as the Teamster strike, but several were killed.” Miriam kept her voice to a near monotone, fighting to keep control of her emotions.
“If I remember right, your oldest sister is a very good seamstress. She and your mother did some work for us at one time?”
“Yes, they did.”
Mrs. Korsheski wrote some notes on the pad of paper in front of her. “You let me work on this. Surely there is a solution to be found.” She looked up, eyes still narrowed in thought. “Tell Miss Wells to come in, please.”
“Thank you.” Miriam stood. “Uh . . .”
“Yes?”
“Uh . . .” Miriam turned and, fighting to keep some semblance of composure, left the room. She nodded to the first of the two young women sitting on the bench outside the door. “You’re next, Vera.”
“What did she . . . ?”
But Miriam had fled down the hall to the women’s room.
“How can I leave them?” She stared at the tear-streaked face in the mirror. “Pull yourself together. It’s not like you are being hauled off to the poor farm or some such. She is trying to help you, and you behave like a flibbertigibbet, with no sense whatsoever. Other people leave home to go for work or school all the time. Or even to travel.”
Travel. A snort caught her by surprise. She had always dreamed of boarding a train and going off to see the world. Or on a ship—not traveling in steerage like her mother had when she came from London and her father from Bingham, but as an actual passenger in a stateroom. Oh girl, such fine dreams you have. Such a foolish waste of time and effort. Pull yourself together. You are a student nurse who has been offered an excellent opportunity. You will not let this pass you by. After all, it is for one year, not for a lifetime. She tucked one stubborn curl under her cap and then another.
Her dark hair had a mind of its own. Staying confined in a net and cap was difficult, to say the least. She splashed water on her face to wipe away any trace of tears and dried her hands. Smoothing her apron, she started for the door, only to be pushed back by the exuberant Vera.
“We are going on a train to North Dakota. Can you believe it? I am so excited!”
“I never would have guessed.” As soon as the words popped out of her mouth, Miriam wanted to bite them back.
“Oh, this is so wonderful.” Vera grabbed her around the waist and spun them both.
“Enough!” Miriam could feel some pins slipping from her hair. At least one pinged on the linoleum floor. “Stop!” She planted her feet as the taller young woman slowed.
Vera stopped all right. A dead stop! Her eyes widened, took on a sparkle as a grin spread her rounded cheeks. “Surely there will be plenty of young men out there, men of courting age, who desire marriage—not just wastrels, but like forever.” The last word came out on a reverent breath. “And whose God is not the bottle.”
Vera wouldn’t mind leaving her family. She had basically cut herself adrift from them when she announced she was registering for nursing school. That she had managed to make it through high school was a testament to the girl’s determination in the face of her family’s derision. Hoity-toity was one of the kinder phrases they used to try to dissuade her.
Miriam knew all this, due to confidences shared through the two years they’d been in school together. “We are not going to Blessing, North Dakota, to find a husband. We are going to improve our nursing skills.”
Vera nodded, but her eyes said, “Just watch.”
Miriam crouched down to locate the hairpins that were no longer in her hair, where they belonged. Locating two, she turned back to the mirror and, after removing the hatpins that secured her cap in place, pulled off the net, sending more pins in flight.
“Now look what you’ve done.” She tried to sound stern but failed. Vera was irrepressible. She knew that, but for some reason had assumed the job of assisting her fellow students to live up to the standards set out by the staff of Morganstein Hospital’s nursing program. They all had been reminded of the standards at the fall meeting that started each new year.
“Give it up. You know only braiding can control that wild mop of yours.” Vera
bent over and retrieved a couple more pins.
The door opened and Corabell Nester, shock blanching her face, stopped just inside and leaned against the wall. “I can’t do this. I just can’t.”
“Why not?” Miriam stared at her in the mirror, at the same time fighting to get the hair net back in place.
“What is it, Corabell? You look like . . . like you’ve seen a ghost.” Vera crossed to her friend and put an arm around her shoulders. “If you think you can’t go to Blessing, why, of course you can. I will be with you and Miriam too.”
“It’s too far. I’ve never been so far from home. Coming here was bad enough, and now I’m supposed to go halfway around the world to—”
“First off. North Dakota is only a couple of days by train. It is not halfway around the world, and secondly, don’t be a goose. Of course you can do it.” Miriam almost said a most unladylike and unnurselike word as she fussed with her hair. “Maybe I should just cut all this hair off and be done with it.”
Corabell and Vera stared at her in the mirror, their mouths open and eyes round in shock. “You wouldn’t.” Even their voices matched.
Miriam stuck the hatpins through the muffin-like white cap, fixing it to her hair as firmly as possible. She checked the clock. “We have exactly four minutes to get to class.” The others groaned as they all headed for the door. Now was the time to concentrate on the lecture and put all the worries of a possible upcoming trip to bed for a time.
Arm in arm, the three marched down the hall to the classroom, pasted the proper decorum on their faces, and made their way to their assigned seats. At least they weren’t the last to enter the room, but still they earned the frown of Professor Gutenheimer.
“Good you could come.” With steely eyes, the gray-haired man in the frock coat glared at the two nurses who tried to tiptoe in after the three.
“Uh, yes, sir.”
Miriam crushed the sigh that threatened to erupt. This man might be head of his field, but how did he manage to remain an instructor here at the Morganstein Hospital? He quite obviously did not respect the calling of nursing but held them and probably all women in contempt. Pompous was far too mild a term to apply to His Honor. What would his comeuppance take?
A sneaky thought slipped through her mind. At least in North Dakota they would not have to endure the snide remarks of Dr. Gutenheimer of Harvard, as he was always introduced, including when he introduced himself.
An hour and a half later, the class filed out, all of them looking as bleary-eyed as Miriam felt. Dr. Gutenheimer had expounded on the benefits and uses of carbolic acid, which he called phenol, as if it were a recent discovery and therefore causing a great deal of excitement in the medical community.
Where had he been for the last fifty years that carbolic acid had been in use? She had been reading some of the American Medical Association publications in the hospital library. If this drug worked as well as those who discovered it said, it would be a wonder drug in the fight against infection, the likes of which they’d not seen before. Hyperbole like that only caused her to raise her eyebrows.
At the supper table, the discussion continued amongst the nurses. But Miriam was forced to leave before they finished, since she had the night shift and needed at least a few hours’ sleep before going out on the floor. Sometimes the night shift was easier, depending on the cases.
If only sleep could be easy, but her mind could not or would not leave her family. How would they ever survive without her? They needed not only the money she sent home but the medical help for her mother and the work she was able to send to her siblings when she saw a need they could fill at the hospital. They wouldn’t even be able to talk with her—not that they could easily now, but . . . the miles apart seemed impossible.
What if her mother died in one of her attacks and Miriam was too far away to help? She was getting visibly weaker all the time.
And how could Miriam herself go on without her mother’s wisdom?
Chapter 17
BLESSING, NORTH DAKOTA
Onkel Hjelmer, I am having serious doubts about continuing to work on the well-drilling crew. We keep having to travel farther from Blessing, and with Onkel Haakan unable to work the fields now, I need to be here.”
Hjelmer shook his head. “Trygve, I understand your feelings, but I have another twenty or so orders, and the farmers are already getting impatient with us taking so long to get to them. If I can’t send this crew out, I’ll have to cancel, and . . .” He stared down at the kitchen table. Penny had the store open and with Linnea helping her and the younger children out pulling weeds in the garden, the house was strangely silent.
“I thought of that. I hate to leave you in the lurch like this, but Gus Baard could run this crew. We’ve worked together now for more than a year, and he is as level-headed as they come. You know that.”
“I was hoping to start a second crew with him as lead. I’ve even ordered the wagon.” Hjelmer looked at the book where he kept his notes. “It should be here any day. Then we need to outfit it.”
“You need to talk to Mr. Sam about some repairs on the one we have. All the wheel rims should be reset, and that rear axle is wearing.”
“What we could do is move all the tools to the new wagon so the crew can head out again without waiting for the repairs.”
“True.” Did he not hear me? Trygve stared at his onkel. “Where are the new wells to be dug?”
“Western North Dakota and eastern Montana. I’m thinking to put everything on a railcar so you can get there more quickly.”
“Hjelmer, I cannot go out with this crew. I am needed here.”
“Well, Lars said all the seeding was done, so things will be a bit slower until haying starts, and—”
“Haying will start in a week or so. Not time enough for me to go out and come back. I’m sorry, but this is the way it has to be.”
“But Jonathan is back now. He’ll be helping.”
Did the man never think of anyone but himself? Trygve tried to ignore the bubbling and snorting of his awakening anger. “They should pay someone else to help when this able-bodied son will be out drilling wells?” For years he’d heard his mor and far’s comments on the younger of the Bjorklund brothers, who would rather be gallivanting around the country than staying home to help with the family store and raising the family, leaving all that up to Penny.
Granted, Hjelmer had a gift for making money. It seemed that whatever he put his mind to prospered, the drilling crew a case in point. He’d even done a stint in the state legislature, but for some reason, chose not to run again. Possibly because his family was so unhappy in Bismarck. When Penny was forced to take the store back from the scalawag who bought it and got run out of town, the family returned to Blessing.
These thoughts railroaded through Trygve’s head while he fought to calm himself. Instead of yelling like he wanted, he said softly, deliberately inserting a thread of steel in his voice, “I will do what I can to help you from here, but I will not be going out with this crew. Gus can take over without any problem. He has shared all parts of the job, and he knows the men. We’d need to find one more to go with him. I was thinking of the Geddick sons. Joseph and Heinz are hard workers and dependable.”
“True.” Hjelmer shook his head. “That is all well and good, but I was counting on you. How about if I give you a raise? You do this trip and—”
“No!” Trygve sucked in a deep breath and unclamped his teeth so he could talk. “You give the raise to Gus, since he’ll be running the crew. If you want I will get the wagon repaired and help get another crew on board. If not, give me my paycheck and we will call it good.” A smile was beyond what he could do with his reclamped jaw.
“Some gratitude . . .” Hjelmer muttered under his breath.
That’s it! Trygve slapped his hands on the table and pushed back his chair.
“Now, don’t go getting in a huff. We’ll work this out. I’ll have your pay this afternoon after the bank opens.” He
put on a smile. “I don’t want this to come between us. You go ahead and do what you said, and if you will get this crew up and going, I’d appreciate it.”
“Takk. I’ll take care of that immediately. Do you want to talk with Gus or do you want me to?”
“You go ahead and then have him come to see me.” Hjelmer stuck out his hand and Trygve shook it.
“Will you be around?”
“Ja, for a few more days.”
Trygve stood. “I’ll talk with you soon.”
Hjelmer looked up from some notes he was writing. There might have been a bit of frost in his eyes, but Trygve chose to ignore that and headed back outside.
Whistling, he stepped out on the porch. He would not be traveling with this crew. The thought both pleased him and left a bit of a pang. Haying was not his favorite job. Samuel loved farming with his father, like his cousin Andrew, but Trygve had really enjoyed traveling in the wagon, putting up a new well, and moving on. Perhaps he had a bit of the wanderlust, like Sophie used to have. Besides, if Jonathan and Grace had their way, they would be building an addition on to the deaf school in this next year.
“How did it go?” his mother asked when Trygve strolled in the door just before dinner.
“Well, Hjelmer tried to keep me running the crew, but when I stood up to leave, he talked business. I will not be going out again, but I will be helping get this crew out, with Gus as foreman.” He went on to describe the meeting, taking platters and bowls from Kaaren’s hands to set on the table. “Where are Grace and Jonathan?”
“Over at their house. They’ll be back when I ring the dinner bell.”
“Good. How do you think Onkel Haakan is really doing? I was planning on stopping there again on the way home, but after getting the wagon to Mr. Sam, I ran out of time.”
To Everything a Season Page 13