The Settlers (8 page)

“I sure will like to taste my own wheat bread!”

Olausson advised him to raise Indian corn, which could be used as food for both people and livestock. The corn gave a fifty-fold return down in Illinois.

“You must plant the corn on high ground! It needs dry land,” he added, and pointed up the hill.

Karl Oskar thought to himself that he knew best where his field was dry and where it was wet. But he put aside the thought and led Olausson a bit up the hill to a grove of tall leafy trees. Shaded by enormous sugar maples lay the foundation for his new house.

“Here’s where I’ll build our new home! I’ll have a real house here!”

He pointed to the foundation. The house would be forty feet from gable to gable, eighteen feet wide, with two stories. They would have four or five times as much space as they now had in the cabin. And this time he wouldn’t build with fresh logs as he had done earlier; the logs had dried out and left cracks that let in cold and wind in winter. But for his new house he had felled the timbers during the two winters past and had dressed the logs on all sides so that they had dried out well. He had intended to build the house this summer, but he must first raise a threshing shed so he needn’t do his threshing down on the lake ice as he had done last winter. But next year his house would rise here under the shade of the maples. From the windows here on the south side he would be able to look out over his fields and the lake; they would be able to see all the way to those islets out there.

As he talked Karl Oskar became excited; he would not let the visitor interrupt. He talked about the house which didn’t as yet exist, about roof and walls not yet raised, about the view from windows still imaginary. He touched the sills, the heavy timbers he alone had put in, he touched them as if caressing them: here would be the main room, here a bedroom on each gable, and just here—all this space for a large kitchen. And, pointing up toward the sky, up there would be a second floor with two large or four small rooms, as yet he hadn’t decided which . . .

Petrus Olausson had paced off the foundation: “Too much of a house! Remember I told you so, Nilsson! You can’t build that much!”

Kristina had told him the same thing, but a woman couldn’t understand much about building, he had thought. Now, when his new neighbor raised the same objection, he became thoughtful. Perhaps he had laid out too big a house, perhaps it would be too much for him to build. Possibly he might have to shorten the foundation timbers . . .

But there was still something to show Olausson, something near the east gable. There, six or eight feet beyond the sill, Karl Oskar pointed downward with the look of one disclosing a great secret:

“Look here! See that thing growing there? It is from Sweden!”

In a little dug-up bed a small plant, six or seven inches tall and tied to a stake, poked its head up from the black soil. The plant had a few small dark-green leaves, and the bed around it was well tended.

“It came from home!”

Olausson bent down and pinched the leaves of the tender plant. “An apple seedling, eh?”

“A real fine tree! An Astrakhan apple tree!”

“From Sweden? Well, well . . .”

It was for his wife’s sake he had planted the seedling, said Karl Oskar. She longed for home at times and it would be a pleasure and something to divert her thoughts to have a growing plant from Sweden to tend and look after. He had written to her parents for seeds from an Astrakhan apple tree, and they had arrived a year ago last fall, glued to a sheet of paper and well preserved. And so he had planted them here at the east gable of their new home, at a depth five times their own thickness, as they used to do when planting trees at home. And this seedling had come up; it was growing slowly, but it was growing.

It was Kristina’s apple tree, she took care of it. With this tiny plant, as yet so puny and tender, they had in a way moved something living from their old homeland.

“You might get some other kind of apples when you plant a seed,” said Olausson.

“Yes—sometimes you get crab apples. We’ll see!”

Karl Oskar had now shown his neighbor the fruit of all his work. Petrus Olausson could see that they had improved themselves during their first three years on the claim. If Petrus only listened to what Kristina had said about their loneliness out here, he might think all they did was walk about and sigh for company, doing nothing beyond getting their food from day to day.

The men went back to the cabin. Kristina wanted to warm up whatever coffee was left in the pot, but Uncle Petrus couldn’t stay away any longer from his timber felling.

He had looked about closely, he said, and he had seen how much work they had done on their claim and what great improvements they had made. This was the beginning of a fine farm. But as a fellow Christian he wanted to add something before he left: work alone was not enough for a human being; daily prayers were also needed. As neighbors they ought to get together to help instruct each other in religious matters and share other useful thoughts.

“We’ll see each other often, I hope! And my dear Swedish fellow Christians: don’t dig yourself down in worldly matters so that you forget eternity!”

—4—

When Karl Oskar and Kristina went to bed that evening they began to talk about this day which had become unlike all other days on their lonely claim.

“I think I like him,” said Kristina.

“He seems a capable man with good ideas. He’ll do here.”

“He talked as godly as a minister.”

“But he wants to have you do things his way. He wants to correct others. I don’t like that.”

“He meant well when he spoke that way . . .”

“I don’t need a guardian—I’m old enough . . .”

“Yes, of course, but we must try to get along with them.”

“They can take care of theirs and we’ll look after ours. Then we’ll get along as neighbors . . .”

“He must have thought we were heathens, not saying grace,” said Kristina, after a pause.

Karl Oskar yawned loudly. He turned over on his side to go to sleep. In his deep fatigue after a long day’s work he was glad to surrender to rest. But when he had walked a great deal, as today, he felt the old injury to his left leg, and it took longer for sleep to come. Tonight his leg ached persistently.

Kristina gathered her thoughts for her evening prayer. Petrus Olausson’s exhorting words at his departure still rang in her ears. And as she thought about them, they sounded as a warning to her from God himself.

In this out-of-the-way place they neglected their spiritual needs. But someone coming from the outside and looking at them with a stranger’s eyes could see how things were with them; they put religion aside. They neglected their souls and jeopardized their salvation. They were so busy gathering food for their table that they could not take even a moment to say grace. They hurried hither and yon from morning to night, and were so rushed one might think they feared they had not time to reach their graves. For in the grave they would end up at last. Here they labored, striving, and were so overloaded with daily chores that both their bodies and souls were submerged in worldly concerns. They lived the fleeting life of the moment and forgot that eternity awaited them.

Kristina sinned every day in many ways, gathering on her back an ever greater burden of sin. In Sweden, she had been relieved of this burden once a month through the sacrament, the Holy Communion. But now she had not been a guest at the Lord’s table for three years. During this whole time she had not once cleansed herself in the Savior’s blood.

From time to time she would talk of religious matters with her Uncle Danjel and confess her anxiety about her sin burden. But he considered himself so great a sinner that he was unable to help anyone else; each one must worry about his own soul. But Danjel did pray for her.

Karl Oskar at her side turned and tried to find a more comfortable position: “If those screech-hoppers out there ever could shut up!”

Outside, the crickets had started their unceasing noise. The penetrating sound screeched like an ungreased wagon wheel moving at a dizzying speed. The hoppers were never seen, but their noise was worse. These ungodly creatures had wings it was said, but unable to fly, they used them for their eternal complaint.

Kristina wondered what could make the poor critters wail like this all night through, as if they were suffering eternal torture. And she would lie and listen to that sound until it echoed within herself, the torture of her own anxiety responding to the crickets’ wailing.

“Karl Oskar,” she said, “you have a good remembering . . .”

“Yes?” he said sleepily. “What about?”

“Do you recall when we last had the sacrament?”

“The last Sunday before we left home.”

“That was three years in April. Three years since we last received absolution.”

He turned to her and sought her face in the dark but his eyes could not see her. He sounded surprised: “Are you lying there worrying about Communion?”

“I’m worrying about our sin burdens. They have gathered on our backs for a long time.”

“We live in a wilderness, Kristina,” he replied, “with no churches or temples; we can’t get to a minister or to our own church. It can’t be helped if we’ve had to be without the sacrament for three years. No one can take what he can’t reach. God must know this and overlook it . . .”

“Perhaps he will forgive us . . . I don’t know . . .”

No one could know if they were forgiven because they lived so far away from the church, she said. And Karl Oskar had not given much thought to this shriving. To tell the truth, he hadn’t had time to miss the monthly Communion since he arrived here, and perhaps that wasn’t so good of him.

“We’ve dug ourselves down in worldly doings,” continued his wife. “We live only in the flesh. We forget our souls which will live through eternity. We forget death.”

“I know I’ll come to an end eventually. But one can’t go around and worry about death all day long. If I did, I wouldn’t get anything done.”

If there was anything he could do about death, well, then it would be different, added Karl Oskar. If he himself could do anything to escape death, then he would do it, of course. But as it was, the hour of death was sure, he must come to an end sometime, death would take him without mercy. So it was no use to worry and fret about it. All one could do was lie down and give up one’s breath when the time came, lie nicely on one’s back and draw the last breath. So the old ones did; on their deathbeds they did not pay much attention to death, since it was inescapable. They usually thought more of their funerals. Death was one and the same for all, equally unmerciful to all, but the funerals could be different—different splendor for different people. And those who had received little praise or honor in life often wished to be honored as corpses.

“But there must be moments when you think of eternity, what comes afterward, Karl Oskar?”

What was the matter with Kristina and her religious question this evening? He didn’t know what more to say. But it was true, he did forget his prayers. A settler with endless concerns about keeping alive had little time to think of eternity.

Karl Oskar replied, with some hesitation, that he didn’t really understand eternity. His head couldn’t make out something that had neither beginning nor end. His mind could not grasp something that was to last forever. All he could wish was that God might have given him a better mind.

Kristina clung to this wish of his; Karl Oskar did seem humble tonight, at least more submissive than he usually was. She often felt that he lived arrogantly and trusted more in himself than in God.

Out there, on the other side of the window, the crickets screeched and wailed unceasingly. There was a host of them around the house tonight, their noise coming from the grass, from the boughs of the trees. But those peculiar bugs were hidden from human eyes. They were the night’s whistle pipes, blowing away as if calling an alarm and warning against threatening dangers.

The long, drawn-out wailing of those invisible creatures turned Kristina’s thoughts to eternity’s torture.

“Karl Oskar—if you should come to an end this very night—do you believe all would be well with you?”

It was a minute before his reply came: “If I didn’t believe so—what would you want me to do about it, Kristina?”

Now he was the questioner. And she had no reply.

“What do you want me to do for my soul? I can’t get absolution for my sins. What else?” It was all he could say. They were in the same predicament. She had asked in order to be helped; he had no help to give. Their situation was the same. What could they do about it?

After this Kristina lay silent and did not ask any more questions.

“We must get some sleep,” said Karl Oskar. “Tomorrow brings new chores—we will be useless if we don’t get some sleep.”

He was right, it wouldn’t help to lie awake. They needed strength for the morrow. They must get up and labor through another day of their earthly life. It was man’s lot here on earth: to labor through each day in turn. And they must have rest so they could begin the new day with fresh confidence. The evening fatigue always depressed her spirits, but she would have them back again in the morning after sleep and rest.

Kristina could soon tell from her husband’s deep breathing that he was asleep. But she continued to lie awake.

—5—

A thousand days and more had passed since Kristina had heard the ringing of church bells.

That was in another world, the Old World. In her parental home, in another Duvemåla, she had heard them from the distant church steeple. Every Saturday evening, with their clear tone, they rang in the Holy Day peace, every Sunday morning they vibrated over the village, calling the people together. And the villagers gathered on the church green and looked up and hearkened when the church bells began to peal: the men lifted their hats, the women curtsied. People heard the bells as a voice from above; they paid reverence to their Creator.

At home, each time something of importance happened, the church bells would ring: in war and pestilence, for forest fires or houses burning, at death and the crowning of kings, at marriage festivities and for funeral sorrow—man, made of earth, was brought back to earth with the pealing of church bells.