A Heart for Home (2 page)

She knelt beside an older girl and received a shy smile. “You look like you’re feeling better.”

The girl’s fever had broken and she was starting to regain her strength. This would be one of their success stories. In a couple of days she would be up and helping with the others. Astrid moved on when her eyes drifted closed.

The breeze from the open windows helped to cool some of the sufferers. And the two faithful women, who did exactly as Astrid told them, were forcing death to turn around and flee out the door. Had they only had screens on the windows, one more plague, the flies, would be ousted also.

By late afternoon when Astrid entered the last tepee for the day, she found a young brave delirious and burning with fever. The rash of measles that covered his body told the tale. A young woman lay dead beside him, her dead baby at her breast.

Astrid turned and left the tent. This was too much. Why had no one checked on them? It appeared that the woman had not been dead for long, but the baby was only a bundle of bones covered by skin. Astrid closed her eyes and raised her face to the sun
. Lord God, this
is too much. I cannot do this any longer.
She paced around the outside of the tepee and fought with herself to open the flap to reenter.

“What is it?” Pastor Solberg asked as he stopped beside her. Astrid gestured to the inside, blinking hard to keep from crying. Dr. Elizabeth had struggled to have children and then, when she finally conceived, nearly died trying to birth one. These babies and children were left to die, to starve to death.
Lord, this is not fair.
She knew that was not the answer, but right now, had God been standing in front of her, she felt like shaking her fist in His face. Did He not care for all of His children? Or, as some believed, were these not His children after all?

“Astrid.” After peering inside the tent, Solberg touched her arm. “Astrid, do you want us to take him to the infirmary?”

She shook her head, forcing herself to return to the present. “How do you trust God when you see things like this?” The words burst forth, breaking the dam. “I believe His Word, but when I see this horror, I am furious.”

“As rightly you should be. There is no excuse for this. But to blame God?” He shook his head. “Think it through, my dear.”

“But He has the power to take care of all of His people. Are these not
His
children too? We have so much, and they are here dying of hunger and disease. When we get sick at home, it is serious, yes, but not to the point of most everyone dying.”

“But this is a white man’s disease. And our diseases slaughter the Africans and the Indians alike. Someday we will know why and how, but for now, whose fault is it that these people have no food? Who is it that forced them to live on a reservation instead of wandering free, as they did for centuries? Why are they being forced to accept a new way of living, of farming rather than hunting?”

“I’ve read of other tribes that farm. The Navajo raise sheep and goats and plant gardens. Some other Sioux do too. But you are saying that our government is at fault.”

“Yes, and who is our government?”

“The men in Washington.”

“Many of whom hate Indians.”

Like Joshua does. Astrid’s mind flitted back to Blessing, where the man she had thought she was falling in love with had argued with her about her going to help the Indians. “But God is bigger than our government.”

“He is that, but He expects us to take care of each other on this earth. He says to love everyone and do good to those who hurt you.”

“Always back to that.” Astrid heaved a sigh. “Let’s get this man moved, and the others can take care of their dead.”

“Judging by the symbols on the hides of this tepee, he appears to be an important young man. You would do well to help him recover.”

“As if that were in my hands. Where’s the litter?”

She assessed the brave again when he was clean and lying on a clean pallet. He reminded her of Red Hawk. The same build, the same nose and wide brow. Could this be a relative? She told the women to keep changing the cloths to bring his fever down and to get some broth into him. Mixing several of her mother’s simples, she poured hot water over them to steep them and told the women to give him a few spoonfuls of the tea every hour or so, then pointed out several other patients who needed the same.

“If you mix some honey with it for the children, it will taste better.”

One of the older women smiled at her, dark eyes flashing. Astrid nodded. Maybe things were turning around, even a tiny bit. Get women working together and everyone was helped. If only she could talk with them, find out if anyone in the tribe knew of the healing plants. Seeing their dark-skinned faces made her wish for Metiz. Her mother would tell stories about all those years ago when the Norwegians first homesteaded the land, how the old woman had shared her knowledge of things natural with Ingeborg and thusly all the people of Blessing
. Perhaps one of the reasons I am here is because of Metiz.
Maybe this is my turn to return the gifts she shared with my family so
long ago
. Astrid knew her mother thought that way. It was one reason she was so willing for Haakan to come along.

That night at supper at Thomas Moore’s house, Astrid listened more than taking part in the conversation. Pastor Solberg and her father were doing just fine without her. Her mind flitted off to the outside, where she would rather have been. The agent’s house was a hundred yards or more from what they were calling the infirmary, where government supplies had been stored at one time. The only supplies in it now were what they had brought from Blessing. The tepees were about the same distance down the creek, and Haakan had insisted they park their wagons upstream from the settlement, establishing the fourth corner of a square, with the fires for cooking and cleaning near the center.

The porches on both the front and the back of the agent’s house made it look larger than it was, huddling into the ground as if seeking refuge. An American flag flew from a pole on the northeastern corner of the front porch. With no plants around it, the house looked more military than welcoming.

“Would you care for more dessert?” Mrs. Moore asked Astrid softly.

She brought herself back to the present. “No, thank you. The meal was delicious.”

“Then shall we retire to my ladies’ parlor and leave the gentlemen to their discussion?”

Astrid almost said, “You go, and I’ll stay here, where the discussion is interesting,” but she knew her far would not approve. He was as much a stickler for manners as Mor was, and he’d heard the invitation. So she followed the lead of her young hostess, excused herself, and stepped through a curtained doorway into another room.

Glancing around the parlor, she wondered where the money had come from. Walnut furniture, wallpaper, heavy curtains. How many wagon trains had it taken to bring all that finery those last miles? “Your home is lovely,” she commented.

“Thank you. So many of these things are my mother’s. I couldn’t bear to leave them behind, and once we arrived here and saw the desolation, I was even more grateful to have a nice home for Mr. Moore to return to. He works so hard for the Indians, but they don’t show much appreciation for what he is doing.”

Maybe they don’t see this as better.
Astrid tried to think of something polite to say. “Have you been trying to set up a school or education for them?”

“No, I don’t mingle with the natives. Just with Ann, who comes in to help me. Training her has been difficult beyond belief. Even such simple things as washing her hands.”

“And you pay her for working for you?”

“Yes, at least I think so. Thomas takes care of all our financial affairs.”

“Have you planted a garden? That was one of the first things my mother did when she arrived in North Dakota. Fresh food is so important.”

“Thomas did, but it is not doing well. The lack of rain, you know.”

So why don’t you carry water to it?
“I take it you don’t go outside much?”

“Thomas says it is too dangerous out there for me. And besides, this sun is so hot that it beams right through my parasol.”

“Where did you come from? Where’s home?” Being polite was getting more difficult by the minute.

“I grew up in Philadelphia, and I met Thomas at a cotillion. In his blue uniform with gold trim, he was the most dashing young man there. Land sakes, but he was the delight of every woman who saw him.” She spread her fan and fanned her heavily powdered face. “Doesn’t this heat bother you?”

I’m sure I don’t have all the petticoats and corset and other feminine
underthings that you are wearing
. “We who live on the prairie learn to dress to fit the climate, so the heat doesn’t do us in. Fashion isn’t as important here as in the cities.”

“That is such a shame. I would hate for my mamma to come clear out here and see what a hovel we are living in. I try to make it as nice as I am able. Also to show the savages that there is indeed a better way to live. Keeping up a stylish appearance is one of the ways I encourage my husband.”

Astrid nearly dropped her teacup. She set it back in the saucer and wiped her mouth with the dainty napkin. Casting back through their conversation in an effort to change the subject, she thought of the uniform. “So Mr. Moore was in the army?”

“Yes, but when he learned they wanted civilians as Indian agents, he left the service. He felt he could be more useful this way. My Thomas has always desired to help those less fortunate.”

“That is a very good thing.” Astrid paused, again trying to think of what to say. “You know, you could read to the children.”

Mrs. Moore stared at her. “Why? They wouldn’t understand the story.”

“You could teach them.”

“Mr. Moore is seeking for a teacher to come out here. And while I have not met Dr. Red Hawk, he will be back in the fall.”

“I am acquainted with Dr. Red Hawk. I attended school with him for a time. Medical school in Chicago. He cares deeply for his people.”
He and I did a lot of sparring over that corpse we dissected.
“His request for help is what brought me and my companions here.”

“I do hope he is learning some culture while he is there.”

Astrid placed her saucer and cup very carefully on the table and rose. “Thank you, Mrs. Moore, for a lovely dinner, but I need to return to my patients for a last check before bedtime. No, don’t bother to see me out. I’ll leave the men talking and slip out the back door.”

She smiled again and made sure she walked sedately out through the kitchen, where Ann was cleaning up from the dinner. “Good night,”
she said with a smile to the young woman.

She hoped stomping her feet all the way to the infirmary would release her anger, but it didn’t. In the infirmary, she cuddled a baby who was crying, and that did help. The smile that she received when handing him back to Gray Smoke, a woman with silver hair and only two lower front teeth, did the rest. If the price of having a meal with the Moores was making polite conversation in the parlor with Mrs. Moore again, she would simply choose not to attend supper.

2

B
LESSING,
N
ORTH
D
AKOTA

Ingeborg Bjorklund brushed the back of her hand across her sweaty forehead. July was surely trying to make up for the cooler June. A rain shower had blown through, and while that had cooled the air for a bit, now everything dripped moisture. Including her. She flipped her sunbonnet back off her head so the slight breeze could fan her face and hair. If Astrid were there, she would laugh and say, “I told you so.” They had always been in contention about sunbonnets and sunburned skin. So much for the dictates of proper etiquette. Not that she’d been much of an adherer to the rules of society this far west, since keeping food on the table was far more important than milk-white skin.

She pulled her leather gloves back on and continued hoeing the potatoes, hilling the dirt up around the plants to keep the sun from burning the potatoes that grew too close to the surface. Emmy, the little Sioux Indian girl who had been found in their haymow last November, came behind her with the kerosene can, picking off the potato bugs and dropping them into the kerosene to die.

“Gramma, this can stinky.” She held up her can.

Ingeborg had failed in keeping sunbonnets on Emmy and Inga, her oldest granddaughter, too. One day she’d found the one she’d sewn for Inga hanging from its strings on one of the apple trees. Whatever Inga did, Emmy copied.

“I know it is stinky, but the bugs will eat our potato plants. Then what will we eat?”

“The bugs?”

Ingeborg smiled at the joke but wondered if perhaps the little girl’s tribe had been forced to eat bugs or starve to death. The thought made her shudder. While she felt Emmy was a gift to her from God so that she could have another child in the house, she knew that the old man they’d assumed was the girl’s uncle could come back for her at any time. He’d come to visit one day, but after he and Emmy had talked, he’d left her there, and the little girl had seemed relieved.