An Untamed Heart

by Lauraine Snelling

  Another step. Another short distance. Another step. Another bit.

  The litter had progressed far enough upward that now Ingeborg had to hold it while dealing with the loose scree beneath her feet. She could not raise her end far enough to keep it level. The fellow would just have to go up the slope with his head tilted downward. It was the best they could do.

  And then, glory of glories, Hjelmer and Anders reached the top. Tor let loose the rope and hurried down to help Ingeborg. One more lift and the young man lay on nearly level ground.

  Ingeborg was breathing so heavily she could not speak. She flopped to sitting. Her arms and shoulders ached even worse than when she had done that plowing. But together they had done it. Thank you, Father! Thank you! She could not stop praising Him.

  She sat up straight. “All right. Kari, will you go back to the seter and bring the others? As many as you can, all but Mari. We will take turns and rest frequently, but still, we need all the help we can get carrying him.”

  “May I ride the horse?” she asked eagerly.

  “Of course.”

  The girl scrambled aboard and nudged the old horse in the sides, sending him picking his way between the rocks and sand.

  Despite her speed on the main trail, it was nearly an hour before Gunlaug and the others appeared on the track ahead. Gunlaug studied their patient.

  “I see he is still breathing, but do you really think there is any chance he can live through all this?”

  “Please, God, let it be so.” Gratefully, Ingeborg turned the whole thing over to Gunlaug and simply trailed behind for a few paces. She’d not traded off like the others.

  A miserable thought struck her. They had left the young man’s rucksack where he had fallen in the ravine. Perhaps tomorrow she would ask Hjelmer to go find the rest of the man’s belongings and bring them in. But not today. The boys had done more than enough today. Men’s work. They looked as weary as she felt.

  Enough idling. She quickened her step and rejoined Gunlaug, sharing the foot end of the litter.

  Gunlaug moved aside, falling into step beside Ingeborg. She flexed her arms and shoulders. “This is worse than carrying milk pails clear to town. Where shall we put him? We can’t get him up into the loft.”

  “Near the fire, with as much padding under him as we can manage. Do you remember when our cow broke her leg?”

  “Your cow? Oh, wait. Ja, I remember. Your far called the doctor, and the doctor put a strange sort of splint on it. He even had a name for it.”

  “We must do the same with this fellow’s leg. And very soft pillows for his poor head. It has been quite beaten upon. But I don’t know what to do about the ribs.”

  “What about the ribs?”

  “Apparently some of them are smashed as well.”

  Gunlaug wagged her head sadly.

  As they finally, gratefully, approached the house, Mari came running out. “Do I set a place at the table for the hiker?” She looked at the litter. “Nei, I suppose not.” And ran back to the house.

  When Ingeborg entered the house, she saw the long table set and waiting. She could smell something delicious—more than one smell. Mari had been busy indeed.

  Near the fireplace they folded as many pillows and blankets as they could find and carefully laid the young man down. Ingeborg and Gunlaug unrolled the staves from the blanket and removed the laces. They folded the free sides of the blanket up over the young man.

  “We have to get him warm,” Ingeborg said. “Heat some rocks to put beside him.” He stirred and opened his eyes. When he saw Ingeborg, he smiled slightly. Apparently he was aware, so she introduced him to her cousin Gunlaug. He drifted off again moments later as the younger ones were seating themselves at the table.

  “Ja. Time to eat.” Ingeborg joined them. “Hjelmer?”

  He recited grace quite rapidly. Mari brought bowls to the table—boiled pork and potatoes, molasses on winter squash, and dried peas with dandelion greens that had finally made an appearance on the hills. What a feast!

  “And dessert,” she announced, setting out a platter of lefse. She took the one chair left, beside Ingeborg. “I did not have enough potatoes, so I made it with extra flour and some of the buttermilk. I thought it tasted good.”

  “Mari, this is wonderful.” Ingeborg paused to savor the squash. “A real feast, complete with lefse! And a feast is very appropriate.” She looked around the table. “All of you! You all worked together in concert perfectly. I am so proud of you! We did an impossible job, and we did it as well as it could be done. You not only worked together and did what was needed of you, you did more than a person can do, sometimes even more than a grown-up would do. I can’t praise you enough. Thank you. And thanks to our heavenly Father.”

  Hjelmer responded around a full mouth. “Ja, and you too, Ingeborg.”

  Mari smiled. “You all were gone so long, I didn’t know if it would be a happy feast or a funeral feast. I’m so glad it’s a happy feast.”

  “He is not on the road to recovery yet, but at least now he is safe and warm.” Ingeborg spooned another helping of pork and potatoes onto her plate. Feast. Yes. Thank you, Lord!

  She left Tor and Kari to help clean up after supper and sat down again beside the patient. That is what he was, a patient. And she was as close to a doctor as he would have for a while. What about that leg? Traction splint. That was the name of the splint the doctor had put on the cow’s leg. It consisted of two splints that stuck out beyond the foot—they had that on this young man now—a sort of harness out on the splints’ free ends, and another harness around the foot. The two harnesses were linked together to prevent the muscles of the leg from bunching up. Did he need one of those? In her imagination she planned how to rig one up, but so far, things seemed to be all right. “Let sleeping dogs lie.” Another Far truism.

  His head. She could not do much about the head other than keep him comfortable.

  The ribs. She thought about the time Onkel Frode broke his ribs. “Gunlaug?”

  Gunlaug came over and sat down beside her. “Ja?”

  “We need something to bind his ribs. Do you have your corset up here?”

  Gunlaug gasped, “Of course not! Bringing a corset up here would be foolish! Nobody would bring her corset to the seter!” She went on a bit more in that vein, quite defensive, it would seem.

  Ingeborg thought, Of course you would, just in case Ivar should come by. But that thought would get her nowhere. So instead, she said, “Certainly it would be foolish. I completely agree. I was thinking more like accidentally. You know, it accidentally got buried in the clothes you were bringing, and you didn’t realize it was up here.”

  “Ah.” Gunlaug studied her suspiciously. “I’ll go dig around a little and see.” She left, and Ingeborg smiled inside. Presently Gunlaug returned and dropped the corset beside Ingeborg’s feet. “You were right. It accidentally got mixed up in everything else. That is lucky, isn’t it?”

  “Very lucky! Before he awakens we will lace it around him. What’s the word? Stabilize him. Not very tightly, just tight enough that when he coughs or moves, the ribs do not move.”

  Gunlaug nodded. “And feed him. Mari has some light soup by the fire that will be perfect.” She sat down on the other side and studied the young man for a few moments. “This whole thing is miraculous, don’t you think? Finding him? Getting him here safely? All of it.”

  “Ja.” She smiled. “Our Father must really love this young man to take care of him so miraculously. He did something very foolish—tramping in the mountains alone, off the track, when he already had unhealed injuries—and God preserved him.”

  “We preserved him.”

  “Gunlaug, you know what Far says. Instruments of God. We are the hammer, but our Father is the carpenter. Do not thank the hammer for a carpentry job well done.”

  I wonder who he is. And I am sure, underneath all his wounds, he might be very attractive. Nils something. Wonder who he really is.

  13
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br />   “Is he worse?” Mari hovered beside Ingeborg.

  Ingeborg started to shake her head but thought the better of it. Mari didn’t need to know all her worries. “I wish I knew. If there is no change . . .” She paused, feeling the frown that made her forehead tight. She kissed her little sister on the forehead. “We just have to wait and see. Surely God is hearing all of our prayers and someone getting better is always a good way to pray. I know God likes to hear those prayers.”

  Do I really believe that? Lord God, what do I believe and does it matter? You know exactly what is going on here. Lord, give me wisdom beyond my knowledge. Should I have one of the boys ride down to Valdres and bring back a doctor? Would he even come this far? Would it be too late? Oh, God, what am I to do? Could a doctor do any more than she could at this point? The picture of a leech sneaked into her mind. The doctor had told her once that he put leeches on a wound that was terribly swollen. The unappetizing creatures helped relieve the swelling. Would there be leeches moving yet in the lake? She didn’t recall ever seeing them before midsummer.

  Nils had a fever now. The boys were taking turns laying cold cloths on his head and on the horribly swollen leg. She had probed the leg with her fingers. It did not seem that the bones had moved, or that she had to fashion the special splint. It was just puffy swollen and quite warm. When they had changed the strips of cloth with which she’d wrapped the splints, she had asked Tor, as probably the strongest, to help, but he had turned an astonishing shade of greenish white at the request. He was no use for laying cold cloths, let alone helping with splints.

  She and Gunlaug took turns spooning broth into the man’s mouth, chicken broth, since they had butchered the mean rooster to make the healing food. Good thing they had a younger rooster coming up, or there would be no chicks hatching at the seter this summer. At least Nils was still able to swallow and had opened his eyes a few times.

  They were on the second day since they’d brought him to the seter. The cold and hail and his fall had done their worst. She could hear noise in his lungs when she put her ear to his chest, although he was breathing more easily since they’d laced Gunlaug’s corset around him. Surely the fall had aggravated the already broken ribs. At least he’d had some times of being awake and could tell them what had happened to him in the other accident.

  Whatever had possessed him to go hiking so soon? And alone? Had he no sense?

  She returned to the chair they had placed by the pallet, where at times Nils thrashed and at other times lay as if already dead but for the bellows-pumping of his breathing. Or fighting to.

  The best way to clear his lungs was to make him cough. Her mother had showed her one time how to use a cupped hand to thump all over the sick person’s back. She said it loosened up the infection and made a person cough more. But in this case? Would that cause more damage to his ribs?

  Finally she shook her head. With the corset in place, his ribs couldn’t move. That was one reason he breathed hard. “Mari, do you know where Gunlaug is?”

  “Out with the sheep.”

  “Oh. And Hjelmer?”

  “At the barn, forking out manure. You want me to go get him?”

  “Ja.”

  The girl hurried off. She and Hjelmer both came running back; Ingeborg could hear them coming.

  Hjelmer skidded to a stop at her side. “What? Is he worse? Is—?”

  “Nei, nei. I just want you to help me sit him up so I can thump on his back.”

  His eyes widened. “You sure?”

  “I am.” Sure enough to be scared to pieces, but I don’t know what else to do.

  She knelt on one side of the pallet and Hjelmer on the other. They each took hold of an arm and, at her nod, pulled the man up to sitting. He groaned and his eyelids flickered, but his chin still fell forward to his chest.

  “Good. Now can you hold him?”

  Keeping one hand on his shoulder to help prop him, she cupped her hand and started thumping firmly at the shoulder and worked her way down. With the corset in the way, she had to thump harder. She was all the way down one side and starting the other when he started to cough.

  Shaking her head at Hjelmer’s look of panic, she continued. Her arm and hand grew tired, but when he coughed again, a deep wrenching kind of cough, a glob of greenish phlegm flew out.

  Standing right beside Ingeborg, Mari gagged.

  “Get a bowl and a wet cloth.”

  She scampered to follow the order. “Here. Do we need cold water too?”

  “Ja and pillows. We need to put something behind him to hold him up.”

  “One of the quilts?”

  “Or even a horse blanket. Anything.” She stopped her thumping when he coughed again, and yet again, each time it brought up more of the infection. When he quit coughing, she wiped his face and returned to thumping, up the other side of his lungs now. A drawing of human lungs she had seen in a book flashed in her mind. He coughed again, a deep ripping kind of cough. She grabbed the bowl with the wet cloth in it and held it ready in case he brought up more again.

  This time he gagged, choked, and struggled to breathe.

  Lord God, what is happening?

  “He’s not breathing.” Hjelmer stared wide-eyed at his sister.

  Gagging, choking, the man struggled for air.

  Lord God, what do I do? Did my thumping break something? What can this be? Frantic, Ingeborg thought of Far’s pounding on someone’s back when they were choking. “Hold him.”

  “I can’t. He’s too strong.”

  Nils threw himself backward, the horrific sounds weakening.

  Ingeborg grabbed his arm again. “Pull him up. Now.” Together they heaved him to a semi-sitting position. “Kari, help us hold him.”

  The girl grabbed the arm, and Ingeborg made fists of her hands and pounded them right up both sides of his spine. When she reached the area between his shoulder blades, she pounded again. A huge, deep gagging cough and a gob of dark bloody mucus erupted from his mouth and projected all the way to his lower legs. Air whistled back into his lungs, real clean air. His chest expanded and contracted again, just as it was supposed to.

  Ingeborg found herself breathing deeply with him, in perfect rhythm. When he paused, she could feel herself tighten up and then exhale in relief when he did. Thank you, Lord God. The litany ran through her mind, over and over. Are we over the worst now? She could hear retching outside the window. Sending white-faced Hjelmer a questioning glance, he half shrugged.

  “Kari. She needs to get a stronger stomach. Living on a farm is better I think, than in town.”

  Ingeborg almost chuckled at her little brother. He was so right, but then they had never lived in a town. She looked up as Kari walked back into the house. “Are you all right now?”

  Kari sniffed and nodded. “I will be. Sorry.” She dipped water out of the bucket and drank. “Do you need water for him?”

  “Not right now. He is breathing good again.”

  “He is still wheezing.”

  “I know, Hjelmer, but there’s nothing we can do about that right now. Let’s get him sitting more upright. He breathes more easily then. And without all that awful stuff in his lungs, perhaps he will get better more quickly.” If she closed her eyes she could see the bloody phlegm, but he didn’t seem any worse now. What if he started to bleed, bright red blood? Her mor said red blood was far worse than dark. What else did she say about it? Think, Ingeborg, think. What if he doesn’t quit bleeding? She closed her mind against any further horror thoughts.

  “Do you want me to ride down and get Mor?” Since there was no real doctor for twenty miles beyond Valdres, their mother was the only one with any real medical knowledge.

  Ingeborg hesitated. What could someone else do that she had not already tried?

  “You could ride him home on the horse.”

  “Then he might lose his leg if the break grew worse.”

  Hjelmer nodded. “Mor would say we should pray and trust that God will make him well a
gain.”

  “I have been. That is for sure.” Ingeborg heaved a sigh of frustration. What was the best thing to do? They had a wagon up here, but it was a dead axle, without springs. On the rough track it would jerk and yaw worse than horseback. What to do? Lord God, what can we do? She nodded once, short and sharp. “We make him as comfortable as possible, keep praying, and believe that God will do as He says.”

  “What is that?”

  “He said to trust Him. We are going to trust Him to take care of Nils and to give us the wisdom to make the right decision.”

  She rolled the quilt and a blanket, and Hjelmer propped them at Nils’s back. “All right, let him back easy.”

  “We need more for his head.” Hjelmer looked around the room. “How about one of the smaller sacks from the pantry?”

  Ingeborg smiled at him and nodded. “Great idea. I’ll hold him while you get it.”

  When he returned, they removed the quilts and snugged the bag of beans up against his lower back and then finished off with the quilts and pillows. “Very good.” Together they stood and nodded at each other.

  When Nils started coughing again, his eyes flickered.

  Ingeborg sank down to her knees and kept him from toppling over. “Keep coughing.”

  His head wagged from side to side, minute motions but a response.

  “Good, you can hear me.”

  He started to say something, but the effort sent him into another paroxysm of coughing.

  “Good, good. Keep coughing.” Only please not like that horrible time. She closed her eyes, pleading.

  A slight headshake and he leaned back against the bracings they had built, breathing hard and well compared to the labored way he had been breathing. Sweat beaded his forehead, so she mopped that away for him.

  “We are going to keep you sitting up so you breathe better.” I hope he won’t remember what happened. Lord, help me to forget it.

  A slight nod she’d have missed had she not been studying him. She glanced down to his leg and realized someone had cleaned up the mess. Who?