Blessing in Disguise (20 page)

On the trip home Hjelmer drew the papers he should have been studying out of his valise and read them thoroughly. Far as he was concerned, with the final drafting of the constitution, his job was finished. And since the constitution was to be ratified by a popular vote in October, he didn’t see any need to continue being involved in the politics of North Dakota. Besides, he’d promised Penny he would stay home more.

He stared out the window into the dark night, ignoring his reflection and letting his mind wander. Why was Penny in such an all-fired hurry to have a baby? Surely God knew best, and if He didn’t see fit to send them children right now, that was fine with him. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have enough to do to keep her plenty busy. Between the church and the store and feeding train passengers and her sewing machine business, she was running faster than a spooked mare all the time anyway.

He shook his head and went back to his reading. With the enactment of statehood, it looked as if there would be changes in the banking rules, along with just about everything else. He planned to bring that up at the meeting. First Bank of Blessing didn’t need a whole series of laws laid down by the eastern banking concerns. The people of Blessing had organized the bank for themselves, and so far they had managed not only to stay solvent but to earn interest for the savings depositors too. The money was mostly earned by investing in one another, like the loan for the boardinghouse, his machinery, and the Baards’ new barn.

Even though he didn’t really think Augusta had come as far as Grand Forks, he questioned the stationmaster and the ticket men there, all to no avail. When he swung off the early-morning train in Blessing, he was no closer to finding his sister than when he’d left. But he knew lots about where she wasn’t and who hadn’t seen her.

He opened the front door to the store carefully. “Hey, Mrs. Bjorklund, you got a cup of coffee for a weary traveler?”

“Hjelmer!” Penny spun away from dusting her spice shelves and darted across the well-stocked room to throw her arms around him.

“I think for a greeting like that, I should be gone more.” He held her close and kissed the tip of her nose and then her laughing mouth.

“No, you don’t.” She thumped him on the arm and then stood on tiptoe to kiss him again, pulling instantly back when the bell tinkled not three feet behind them.

“You look good in red.”

She glanced at her dress, started to say something, then her cheeks flamed even brighter. “Hjelmer Bjorklund, go pour your own coffee. I’ve got work to do.” She straightened her apron. “How can I help you?” she greeted her customer.

“You can go on as you were,” a laughing voice replied.

“Good idea,” Hjelmer whispered. He turned and smiled at the woman behind him. “Good morning, Tante Agnes.” He touched the brim of his black fedora with the tip of his finger.

“Go on with you.” Penny gave him a push toward their home off the store. “Good morning, Tante. What do you need today?”

“Thought I’d wait here while Joseph takes a wheel over to the smithy. You didn’t have to send that handsome young man of yours off like that.” Agnes Baard paused to look over the display of boys’ boots that Penny had gotten in the day before, a smile dimpling her cheek.

“He just came home.” Penny surreptitiously smoothed her hair back where Hjelmer’s hug had pulled it loose from the bun she wore.

“Then you go on back and take care of him. I can just look around to my heart’s content.”

“The coffee is hot.”

Agnes cocked her head and crinkled her eyes. “Well, now, that would taste mighty good, seeing as how we left home hours ago.”

“What have you been doing?”

“Oh, took some things out to that new family, the Rasmussens. How they’re going to be ready for winter is beyond me, ’specially if they go west like the mister wants. Going to take a miracle for sure.”

“Or the women of Blessing Lutheran Church.” Penny brushed aside the curtain that closed off the store from their living quarters.

“Well, I’d say that’s a miracle in its own right.”

“You would.”

Agnes took the chair that Penny pointed her to and glanced around the kitchen-sitting room combined. “Ah, my girl, you have made this such a friendly home. No wonder those railroad men wanted to eat here.”

“They seem to like it just fine over at Bridget’s now. Haven’t had anyone come here and complain I’m not serving anymore.” Penny arranged molasses cookies on a plate and set that on the table. “If you want something more, dinner will be ready in an hour or so.”

“No. This hits the spot.” When the coffee cup was set before her, Agnes dunked her cookie in the steaming brew and nibbled off the spongy part.

“How is it at your house with all the children in school?” Penny set her and Hjelmer’s cups down and took her chair.

“Too quiet. I find myself banging things just to make noise. You know, if we were to find some children like the White boys off the train, I sure would be pleased to take them in. I thought about that this morning out at Ingeborg’s place.” Agnes shook her head, and the light silvered some of the hairs at her temple. “But the best we can do there is provide for the whole family, if those folks aren’t too prideful to accept our help. After all, we all been there one time or another.”

“Are the children old enough for school?”

“One could be but is so shy.” Agnes shook her head. “The other two are barely out of diapers, and the missus has another under the apron. She’s so thin herself that the babe will come with problems, you mark my words.”

Penny looked around her own cheerful kitchen and tried to imagine having nothing. Thanks to their generous friends, when she and Hjelmer married, they already had a good start on a household. And opened the store not much later. But then Hjelmer had already worked hard for his money.

Not to say Mr. Rasmussen hadn’t. Losing everything you owned in a train wreck was a shock for certain. “I guess they must be grateful they were on another train.”

Agnes nodded. “But it’s hard to be grateful when you see all your work come to naught and have to seek help from people you don’t even know. I think having Pastor Solberg to come to makes it easier for the askin’, though.”

“Tante Agnes, glad you could join us.” Hjelmer came down the stairs, white shirts hanging over his arm.

“I suppose you need those for tomorrow?” Penny’s eyes widened.

Hjelmer nodded. “Sorry. I’ll bring in water.”

“And the boiler?”

He sat down at the table, reaching for a cookie at the same time.

“After my coffee.”

“So tell us what you have found out.” Agnes propped both elbows on the table and held her cup at sipping height with both hands.

“Nothing. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Augusta fell off the face of the earth.”

“Don’t say it like that to your mor.” Agnes’s eyebrows flattened in a frown.

“I won’t. I don’t want to say anything to her. No news is good news, you know?”

“Humph, if that isn’t a man.” She turned to her niece. “I got something for you, Penny. Thought it might come in handy here at the store.” Agnes reached down in her bag and brought up some brown papers. She laid them on the table and opened one.

“An envelope?” Penny reached for one of the two-layer contrivances. She pressed the flattened sides, and the papers opened like a mouth. “There’s no flap.”

“No. I cut the paper, folded it in half, and pasted down the side and across the bottom. I figured you could put cookies or a piece of cake or a sandwich in them. You can fold down the top to close it. Easier than wrapping with brown paper and string like you do for cheese and such.”

“What a clever idea.” Penny opened another. “What should we call them?”

“Why, paper bags or sacks, I s’pose. I got the idea looking at a grain sack, only those are sewn up. Joseph says I got too much time on my hands when I have time to play with paper and paste, but I just thought it might be a good thing for you. You give me the paper, and I’ll make more.”

“That would be a good job for Andrew and Ellie. Those two scamps came by yesterday asking if there was anything they could do to earn a penny for candy.”

“So what did you have them do?”

“Nothing. I gave them each a piece of candy.”

“They could have picked up clinkers from the tracks. Save on your woodpile.”

“They could have stacked wood too. Between Sam and Ephraim, there’s quite a bit split.” Hjelmer raised his cup, and Penny rose to refill it. He knew he should be getting on over to the boardinghouse, but the thought of his mother’s sad face kept him in his seat.

“I know, but I love to watch them try to decide which kind to choose. That Andrew, he can talk a bird out of a tree, you know.”

“So how many pieces did he get?” Agnes set her cup down.

“Two.”

“Penny Bjorklund, you’ll spoil that boy to death.”

“I know, but . . .”

A knock sounded at the back door just as the store bell tinkled. Penny got to her feet. “You take that one and I’ll go for the store.” The curtain swirled behind her, leaving Hjelmer to answer the door and Agnes to chuckle over her niece’s soft heart.

“Ah come ta get the tray ready,” Sam said after he and Hjelmer swapped the greetings of old friends. “Dat train be heah befo we know it.” He sniffed in appreciation. “Miss Penny be one mighty fine cook.” Since Sam came, he’d been taking cookies, cake, and sandwiches, along with coffe and milk, out onto the train to sell to passengers.

Hjelmer poured another cup of coffee and pointed to the fourth chair at the table. “Sit down. Those cookies on the table are just waiting for you.”

“You know where my Joseph went?” Agnes asked.

“Right here.” Joseph, going from lean to stringy as he aged, stepped through the store curtain. “Sam came through the back door, but I go around to the front. Figured I find you playing with that sewing machine.”

“I wouldn’t have to play with Penny’s if I had one of my own.” Agnes started to get up to pour the coffee, but Hjelmer waved her back to her seat and did it himself.

“Ah got no time for sittin’. Dat tray need fixin’.” Sam sat on the edge of his chair.

“I’ll start.” Agnes got up and began slicing bread for sandwiches. Penny already had the cheese and meat ready to put on them.

“I can tell when I’m not wanted.” Hjelmer headed for the door.

“Oh no. You can cut the cake and slide it in those bags.” Agnes pointed to the cake pan with her knife.

“I need to talk with Mor.”

“Not now. She’s getting ready for the noon rush too.” Agnes pointed at the cake again.

Sam chuckled as the blond young giant did the bidding of the string-bean woman with years-frosted hair. With all of them working, the tray filled rapidly, and using the new paper sacks, they were able to stack things more closely together.

“Now, don’t that look nice,” Penny said, coming back after her customer left. “Joseph, you two want to stay for dinner?”

“You know we never turn down a free meal.” Joseph leaned back in his chair. “We timed this pretty good, huh, Ma?”

“Sure did. Now you can go fetch water for the boiler.” Still holding her knife, Agnes pointed to the door this time.

“Ya got to listen up to a woman waving a knife,” Joseph advised Hjelmer on his way out the door, leaving everyone laughing.

Some time later, when the train’s boiler had been refilled and those who worked the line, along with the passengers, had their bellies full and the train had gone on down the track, Hjelmer moseyed on over to the boardinghouse, looking forward to talking with his mother about as much as he liked to sweat an iron rim on a wheel. If only he had some good news for her. If only he had Augusta in tow.

“You didn’t find her, huh?” Bridget beat him to the words, elbow deep in bread dough.

“No, sorry.” He went on to tell all he had done, hoping that would make her feel better.

It didn’t.

“Henry might be able to accomplish more, him being a conductor and all. Maybe he can jiggle someone’s memory.” He reached forward and snagged a fingertip of dough, popping it into his mouth before she could scold him.

“Hjelmer Bjorklund, aren’t you never going to grow up?”

“If never having dough again is the price, no thank you.” Hjelmer leaned his haunches against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest. “You thinking of frying some of that? Would taste mighty fine with syrup.”

“I might.” Bridget pushed the heel of her hand into the dough, turned half of it in with her other hand, and spun the fragrant mound at the same time.

Hjelmer watched her. The thump and push, roll and thump again of kneading dough had always intrigued him. Creating something so delicious out of such plain and simple ingredients. Of course that was his mor. Creating beauty in all she did, whether she realized it or not. He glanced around the kitchen. Several rosemaled plates lined a track around the ceiling, and he figured soon she’d have other things up there. Kerosene lamps, their chimneys glistening clean, lined a shelf above the dry sink, ready to be called into service for supper. The huge iron stove gleamed as though freshly blackened.

Did she never rest? He thought back to the times he’d heard her stifle a groan when she got up from her rocking chair or saw her knead the muscles in her lower back. She wouldn’t do that if they didn’t hurt.