A Touch of Grace

by Lauraine Snelling

  She reached up to cup her hand around the chimney lamp and blew out the flame, releasing an odor of smoke and kerosene. Leaving her Bible on the table by the chair, she rose and made her way into the bedroom. At least if she was sleeping, she would quit thinking about all the ramifications. Leaving today’s troubles with this day was excellent advice. After all, she had enough to do tomorrow already. Happy Fourth of July. At least it had started out happy.

  She had to smile at the memory of little Inga. Now, that one could light up a whole room with her smile. Quicksilver for sure. On that happy note she hung her clothes on the peg on the wall and slipped her cambric nightdress over her head, shimmying out of her underthings as the dress fell about her ankles. The chill on the moist breeze tingled up her back, and sliding under the sheet and light blanket felt like a luxury. She turned on her side and laid her arm over Haakan’s upper arm, his gentle snoring pausing a moment as he shifted from his side to flat on his back.

  “You all right?” His voice came soft in the dark.

  “Ja, I am now.”

  “Good.” He brought her hand to his lips for a kiss and was snoring again before she could respond.

  Thank you for Haakan too. She added more to her thank-you list and fell asleep some time along the way.

  “Where’s Grace?” Ingeborg asked Astrid in the morning when she returned from milking.

  “I don’t know. I hated to ask.” She set a small crock of butter she’d brought from the well house on the table. “This was the last one.”

  “I know. We’ll churn today too. Why did you not ask Lars?”

  “He wasn’t smiling.”

  Ingeborg nodded. While Lars was not one to say a lot, he always greeted you with a smile. Except when Sophie left. “Are the boys here?”

  “Ja, but Trygve didn’t have much to say either. He grumbled at Samuel.” Astrid dried her hands after washing them in the dishwater.

  “I think I’ll go see Kaaren while you hull the strawberries.” She nodded to the flat baskets she’d already brought in from the well house. “I did enough to go on the pancakes. That will make your father happy.” Haakan loved strawberries. She planned on strawberry shortcake for dinner, his favorite.

  It didn’t sound like God had taken care of the whole matter overnight. Ingeborg stepped up her praying. With the shadow of Sophie’s runaway wedding still lingering, she hoped Lars would not overreact with Grace.

  I DON’T HAVE TO TALK if I don’t want to.

  Grace dropped the too soft strawberry in the pail for the chickens and picked up another to hull. The fragrance of bubbling strawberry jam filled the room and her senses. Ignoring her mother’s questioning looks was easy if she didn’t look at her. Kaaren had tapped Grace’s shoulder once and, laying a gentle finger under her chin, forced her to look up. But when Grace shook her head, her mother nodded, her brow furrowed, her eyes filled with concern.

  “When you want to talk, you know I want to listen.”

  Grace nodded and went back to her strawberries. Instead of going to the barn for milking, she had gone out to the garden to pick what was left of the ripe strawberries. She should have been home picking the berries yesterday, in spite of the rain, rather than going to join the dancing. Whatever had possessed her to ask Toby to dance? It served her right when he turned away. What man would want to dance with a girl so forward as she had been. Mor must be appalled and her father furious. Girls just did not do such a thing, especially his girls. First Sophie runs off, and now Grace is chasing a man. If it wasn’t so pathetic, she might think it funny.

  If only her heart didn’t hurt so much.

  And here she had scolded Sophie for being so foolish as to think her heart would break if Hamre went back to Ballard without her. Broken hearts hurt terribly. The pain was like slicing her finger with a knife, only deeper. She sniffed back a tear. Or a river of tears. Surely she had cried enough last night.

  She dumped the hulled berries into another saucepan, added the sugar, and mashed the berries with a potato masher. She set the kettle on the back of the stove to heat slowly. Stirring the other kettle, where the thickening jam bubbled gently, she eyed the jars lined up and waiting. Keeping the jam from burning on the bottom kept her hopping. Her mother and Ilse had gone out to pick the peas.

  If she cut rhubarb to add to the second kettle, that would extend the berries. Pushing the fuller kettle to the back of the stove, she headed outside, knife in one hand to cut off the rhubarb tops and a basket in the other. She paused on the steps and raised her face to the sun. The warmth on her face made her close her eyes. At least the sun liked her.

  But I don’t want Toby to just like me. I know he’s my friend, although what kind of friend would be so rude. I want him to love me. Like I love him. Like I have always loved him.

  A rooster crowing broke her concentration. If she didn’t quit looking at the sun, she’d get freckles, and no man wanted a woman with freckles. She stomped down the steps and strode out to the south side of the garden, where the rhubarb grew lush with big leaves. Pulling out the stalks and whacking off the leaves gave her a perverse sense of pleasure. She stuffed the leaves back under the plants to help keep the weeds down and stomped back to the house. Men!

  The fragrance of cooking strawberries met her at the door, reminding her to stir the kettle contents. Then she added wood to the stove, pulled both kettles out to a hotter section, and stirred them again. After washing the stalks, she chopped them into small pieces and dumped them into the smaller kettle, adding more sugar. Rhubarb took a lot of sugar, but it still cut the sweetness of the strawberries.

  She sensed someone coming into the kitchen by the reverberations of the floor, thought about greeting whoever it was, and decided she wasn’t ready to talk yet. Perhaps she’d never be ready to talk. She lifted a ladle of jam to see if it was thick enough. No longer did the jam pour back into the pot in a stream but now clumped with the bright red deepened to carmine. After pulling the pot to the cool end of the stove, where she skimmed the froth off the top and into a saucer, she flipped the waiting jars upright and began filling them with the rich preserves. As she filled them, she tapped each jar on the wood surface to make sure there were no air bubbles. Grace glanced out of the corner of her eye. Whoever had come in had left again.

  With the jars sealed with melted paraffin and lined up, she stepped back to appreciate the sun glinting on the shoulders of the jars. The deep red made her wish for a dress of the same hue. A dress that would catch Toby’s attention and … Do not do that, she ordered herself and dabbed at her nose and eyes with the corner of her apron.

  At a tap on her shoulder, she turned to face her mother.

  “Tell me what is wrong.” Kaaren kept her hands on her daughter’s shoulders so she couldn’t leave.

  Grace shook her head. “I will be all right,” she signed, then ducked out of the grip to go stir the other kettle. In a passing glance she caught Ilse shaking her head. Knowing the way gossip flew about Blessing, the probability of everyone knowing of her rebuff made her clamp her teeth. Perhaps she should get on the train and head west. Surely Penny could use some help, and in a big town like Bismarck, no one would know that Toby left the schoolhouse rather than dance with her. They’d just look at her strangely, like new children did when they moved to Blessing, because she talked funny. She gave the jam such a ferocious stir that the kettle rocked.

  After the second kettle of jam was bottled, she took out a loaf of bread, sliced off three pieces, smothered them in the skimmings, and set them on a plate to take outside on the porch, where Ilse and her mother were shelling peas. Remorse for the way she’d acted rode with a heavy hand on the bit.

  “Here. Would you like buttermilk also?”

  Kaaren shook her head and patted the wooden step beside her. “But thank you for asking.”

  Grace fought with herself over her mother’s gentle action. Then she sank down and, setting the plate on the low table, picked up the remaining slice of bread and
jam. The flavors exploded on her tongue, making her close her eyes to savor them more fully. At least she could make good—no, make that excellent—strawberry jam. She felt her mother’s shoulder leaning into hers. If she kept her eyes closed, she’d not have to respond. And since her hands were busy with the bread, she couldn’t sign.

  But years of being the dutiful daughter caught up with her, and she leaned her head on her mother’s shoulder. “Please don’t say anything, because then I’ll cry some more, and I don’t want to do that.” She felt her mother’s nod.

  When she finished her bread, she automatically picked up a pea pod and dropped the empty pod into her skirt lap after tossing the peas into her mother’s pan. She ate the peas out of the second one. Focusing on shelling peas worked about as well as stirring jam at keeping others out.

  Her mother finally tapped her wrist. When Grace looked at her, she signed, “Where did you go this morning?”

  “To the river. I couldn’t face Astrid.”

  “They were all worried about you.”

  “I know.” The words flew from her fingers. “Did Samuel tell you too?”

  Kaaren nodded.

  “I guess everyone in all of North Dakota knows by now.”

  “I doubt that even all of Blessing knows. Your friends are very protective of you, as are your brothers.”

  “I am so mortified.”

  “I can guess so.”

  “You’d never do anything so stupid.”

  “Perhaps that’s why we have rules of etiquette.”

  Grace blinked and then nodded when her mother signed the last word again. “And I broke them.” She reached down and wrapped her arms around her legs just above her ankles. Sitting on steps allowed one all manner of positions. She laid her cheek on her apron and skirt-clothed knees. One minute she was so angry she could spit horseshoe nails, the next she wanted to fling herself into her mother’s arms and cry her eyes out.

  “What can I do?” she finally muttered.

  “You could go help Sophie with the children. I’m sure that—” She stopped. “Why don’t we both do that.” She called to Ilse, “Would you mind canning the peas by yourself? The men are all eating dinner at Ingeborg’s, so Grace and I will take the afternoon and go help Sophie. With the wedding coming up in a week, I’m sure she’d be glad of some extra help.”

  Grace spent the night before the wedding at the boardinghouse with Sophie. They shared a bed like they had for so many years, returning to their secret hand signals to talk before they fell asleep. When the babies cried for their very early morning feeding and Sophie motioned a sign, Grace rose and brought them to her to be nursed. When they finished, Grace changed them and put them back in their cradle on their sides, spoon fashion like she and Sophie had slept. She rocked the cradle with one foot, sitting on the bed where Sophie lay propped against the pillows.

  “Will you miss the boardinghouse?” Grace signed.

  “I’ll still be here a lot of the time. And Lily Mae will come for me if there’s a problem in the evenings.”

  “I know, but …” Grace motioned around the bedroom with her hand. “You won’t sleep here, and you’ll be making a home for Garth and his children.”

  “I know. They are such good little ones. When the Larsons arrived with the children, Grant asked if he could call me Mama.”

  “And you said?”

  “Yes, of course.” Sophie picked at the hem of the sheet. “Sometimes all this scares me.”

  Grace made a face. “Nothing scares Sophie.”

  “You have no idea. Being alone in Ballard and sick to death pregnant. No Hamre. You can be very sure that I was terrified.”

  “But you knew you could come home.”

  “Did I? What if none of you would ever speak to me again?”

  “But we sent letters. Of course we’d speak to you.” Grace shook her head. “And look how well everything turned out.” She peeked at the sleeping babies and crawled back under the sheet. Leave it to Sophie to make her feel … feel what? Irritated? Frustrated? “Good night again.” She rolled on her side, away from her sister, and tucked her left hand under the pillow. Morning would be here before they knew it.

  “What is Garth’s sister’s name?” Grace signed.

  “Helga, and her husband is Dan. Garth is so relieved they arrived in time.”

  Mor had arrived early enough to join them for a cup of coffee and some of the coffeecake Mrs. Sam had made special for the wedding day. With Garth living at his new house now, they had not had to figure out how to keep Garth from seeing the bride before the ceremony, which was scheduled for ten o’clock at the church.

  “I put the bouquets of snowball blooms on the altar, and Ingeborg is taking care of setting up for the dinner, so all we need to do is get you and your groom and Grace and Dan dressed and to the church on time.”

  “That’s hardly a problem, since the church is only two blocks away.” Sophie cocked her head. Sure enough, one of babies was crying. “I’ll be right back.”

  I’ll never be able to hear my baby cry, Grace thought. How will I know if my children need me? But then, I most likely won’t be getting married, so there is nothing to worry about. After all these years of praying for Toby to love me, he doesn’t. I guess you just can’t make someone love you. Tears burned, and she both sniffed and rolled her eyes to keep them inside. God, couldn’t even you make him love me? But God was silent, not that she’d ever heard Him speak to her like her mother said He did. Did one need to be able to hear for God to speak? He’d healed both deaf and blind people in the Bible, but she guessed He didn’t do such miracles any longer. At least not in her case.

  Later that morning Grace stood beside Sophie at the front of the church, filled with people, and watched Pastor Solberg carefully so she would know how the service was progressing. When he said Garth could now kiss his bride, she turned to watch. Love shone from his eyes as he leaned forward to kiss Sophie.

  A little barb of jealousy made Grace clamp her teeth together. Sophie had now been married for the second time. Two men loved her. And she couldn’t even have one. As her mother often said, life is not fair, but right now that wasn’t much of a comfort. Grace turned to follow Sophie back down the aisle, nodding at the man who held out his arm for her to take. Garth’s brother-in-law smiled at her, making the exit easier. If Toby had only cooperated, perhaps she and Sophie could have had a double wedding, something they had talked about what seemed like years ago.

  Would she ever stop thinking of Toby?

  As the town gathered to celebrate the wedding, she put on an apron and helped set the food out. Sunny skies and a gentle breeze helped make the day perfect. She could see people laughing and talking but decided not to watch. If she stayed in her own little world, she could almost pretend the party was for her—and Toby. She knew she didn’t even need to keep an eye out for him because her heart always told her when he came near. When everyone had been served and sat down, she took the filled pitcher of lemonade and made the rounds to fill glasses. Astrid carried the coffeepot.

  When she came to Jonathan Gould, his friendly smile made her sniff.

  “Mange takk,” he said carefully.

  “Velbekomme.” She nodded her approval as he signed an English thank-you at the same time. She’d never signed in Norwegian, but here he was using both of the skills she and Astrid were teaching him.

  “Come on. It’s our turn to eat.” Astrid set the coffeepot down.

  “No, I’ll—”

  “No you won’t. I know you’re mooning over Toby, but—”

  “I am not mooning!”

  “Sorry. Feeling sad, then. If he comes, I swear I’m going to sic the boys on him.”

  Grace almost smiled. She knew the boys meant Trygve and Samuel. She shook her head. “That’s right. Have a fight going on right here at Sophie’s wedding.”

  Astrid grinned back at her. “Would sure give some excitement.”

  Grace put a slice of chicken and some other
things on her plate just to keep Astrid quiet. She glanced up to see her mother swaying gently with a baby on each arm. Ingeborg reached to take one of them, and the two grandmas swayed in unison, talking about the wedding. Sometimes there was an advantage in lipreading. You didn’t need to be close enough to hear.

  After the food was cleared away and the cake served, Grace was left without anything to do again. Sophie and the two grandmas took the babies over to the house to be nursed. Lars was tuning up his fiddle while the piano from the school was rolled out onto the porch. Grace looked around just in case Toby had arrived and she’d missed him. At least if he wasn’t there, he wouldn’t have to worry about dancing with her.

  Dr. Elizabeth sat down at the piano, and Haakan announced that the dancing would commence.

  Trygve appeared on one side of her and Jonathan on the other. She glanced from one to the other. Trygve bowed, motioned to Jonathan, and with a wink, left her.

  “I hope that means you will dance with me?”

  She caught the last part of his sentence and nodded. He took her hand and led her out for the first waltz. I will not think of Toby. I will not think of Toby. Keeping a smile in place took effort until she lost herself in the smooth motions, counting the beat she could not hear so that she would not step on Jonathan’s feet. As they turned and swirled, she smiled up at him. “You are a good dancer.”

  “Mange takk. I had lots of lessons. So are you. How did you learn?”

  “Thorliff taught Astrid, Sophie, and I together.”

  His smile made her neck warm. Astrid’s insistence that Jonathan was interested in her made her feel slightly uncomfortable, but she decided to ignore that and just enjoy herself. She could feel others watching them, and the thought made her break stride and stumble. Jonathan held her firmly, paused to let her get the correct foot going again, and gave her a smile that caught in her throat. Didn’t it seem a lot like the one that Garth gave Sophie? Could Astrid be right?