Daughter of the Sword (36 page)

Deborah nodded. “I've never understood why people should worship a God who was supposed to have condemned practically all of them to eternal fire before they were even born.”

“Meanwhile,” interpolated Ansjie, “the goose gets cold!”

“It's delicious!” said Deborah. And she disposed of a respectable amount of food before observing, “Your father had unusual ideas, surely. What did your mother think of them?”

“She died at the birth of my younger brother, who is now count. Father took my decision to come here quite philosophically. I think he would've come himself had he lived. Even at seventy-nine he was still avid for new experiences, and, besides, he was very fond of Ansjie. I think she was his favorite child.”

“I was a daughter,” Ansjie said. “Besides,” she added with tolerant affection, “since I was not a
Gräfin
's child, the
Graf
didn't trouble himself about equipping me for a place in society. He just, praise the good God, let me grow!”

Did that mean …?

Sensing Deborah's confusion, Ansjie said matter-of-factly, “Noblemen have always taken pretty women, but the
Graf
was different. He loved my mother and put her in charge of his household, was faithful to her, and brought me up as a daughter.”

“She tended him lovingly in his last years,” Conrad said. “But though my brother made it clear that she was welcome to live on in the castle, she preferred to take a house in the village. Last year she married the chief forester and, from all accounts, is happy.”

That explained several puzzling things. Though Conrad and Ansjie resembled each other, his features were etched, almost ascetic, while hers were rounded. She exuded an earthy robustness and pride in her home and cooking.

“When Conrad said he would come here,” said Ansjie with a fondly indulgent glance at her brother, “Mutti said I must look after him, Besides, there was no one I wished to marry.”

Conrad smiled but Deborah guessed that he was worried about the future of this sister, born between classes, fitting neither. “Since it seems you'll never return the longing of Elder Goerz's son or accept Peter Voth since he became a widower, we'll have to put you in the way of meeting some eligibles.”

“The Territory's full of bachelors,” Deborah said.

“But Friedental isn't.” Conrad smiled teasingly. “We have a carpenter and shoemaker, but we need a blacksmith, and it would be good to have a doctor. Which,
kleines,
shall I recruit first?”

“Whichever is strongest, nicest, and best-looking,” said Ansjie promptly. “He must be honest, no
dummkopf,
and no drunkard. Also, he must enjoy his food and be sure that there is always plenty.” She considered. “These things are more important than his looks, but he must be strong!”

“I'll remember” said Conrad. “No, I simply cannot eat another morsel! If I don't want to become gross, I must find that hungry brother-in-law swiftly!”

“There's
strudel
,” Ansjie said coaxingly. “
Apfel strudel
, Conrad, tender and crunchy, with rich, thick cream.”

“Sometimes,” he groaned, “I think you're fattening me up like the witch in Hansel and Gretel. A very small piece, then, and after she rests, perhaps we could take Deborah around Friedental.”

The
strudel
was the flakiest pastry Deborah had ever eaten. As she helped Ansjie with the dishes, Ansjie explained that the unusual flavoring of the goose was due to being rubbed with caraway seeds, and the red cabbage was cooked with onions, fat, and caraway. When the last pan was stowed away, Ansjie took Deborah into a large bedroom.

Several feet of the brick oven warmed this room, too. Ansjie said that Conrad, knowing there would be a scarcity of wood, had studied the problem and learned of the hay-burning stoves used in Russia. The brick structures were rather expensive, but only needed firing morning and night and heated several rooms, served for cooking, and also the wide chimney was used for smoking meat.

Ansjie's pretty canopied bed was a fluffy mass of blue featherbeds, but the plain bed set up on the other side of a dresser was heaped equally high and looked wonderfully inviting. There was a large carved chest under the window and an armoire which Ansjie opened to reveal many pretty gowns, shoes, hats, and a cleared space.

“We're of a height,” Ansjie said. “We must find a few dresses you like and change them to fit.” She brushed aside Deborah's objections. “
Please
help me wear them out! Then I can tell Conrad I need some new clothes. He's not stingy, but he's a
man
and understands nothing of such things. I feel wasteful to ask for something different when these are still good, but a woman needs something special now and then,
nicht wahr?
”

Deborah had to smile at the appeal. “If you put it that way, I'll be glad to help you justify a few new dresses.”

Ansjie gave her a quick hug. “I'm so glad you've come! It'll be like having a sister! I wanted to come with Conrad, but I didn't realize how homesick I'd get sometimes.”

“Are there no young women in the village?”

“All my age are married. Besides, in spite of equal votes on public matters, the people still think of Conrad as the
Graf
and me as his sinfully born sister.” Her lower lip jutted petulantly before she giggled. “It's a good thing I don't fancy any of the young men! Their families wouldn't want them to marry out of the faith, and I could never be a Mennonite. I like pretty clothes and jewelry too much!”

Deborah forebore to say that lack of these wasn't confined to those who eschewed them for piety's sake. As Ansjie went out, wishing her a good rest, she was more than ready to slip off her dress and shoes and get into bed, the sketch pad tucked beneath the bottom feather mattress.

Enveloped in down below and above, she thought she'd never felt anything so luxurious. She meant to stay there just a little while, relaxing after the long ride, but comfort, the content and happiness that radiated through the house like Ansjie's distant singing, sent her deeper and deeper, like snuggling into a nest.

She awoke to Ansjie's touch and smiling eyes. “If you don't rouse now, you might not sleep tonight,” she said. “And there are only a few hours of light left. Do you feel like walking?”

Deborah nodded, swinging her legs off the high bed to a padded stool. She dressed quickly, but before they started on their outing Ansjie showed her the toilet, a white frame building behind the stable. It was whitewashed inside, there was even a curtained window, and Deborah laughed at the thought of, for instance, Johnny's probable reaction to such elegance, though she was careful not to betray her mirth to her hostess. As Johnny had predicted, this was indeed a world apart!

xvi

Though the Landers had their own well because of their distance from the settlement, the other families relied on a well located near the church beneath several large cotton-woods. This was a place for the children to play while their mothers visited, and here Deborah met the wife of Elder Goerz, a dour woman who regarded Ansjie with suspicion and seemed to feel that Deborah, too, was a sort to bear watching.

“She thinks everyone's after that hulking son of hers,” Ansjie whispered as they exchanged polite farewells and moved toward the church. “I hope he finds someone to marry
quick
so she'll stop watching me with eyes like boiled eggs!”

“Your other suitor, Peter Voth, doesn't have a mother,” Conrad teased.

“And he's old enough to be my father,” Ansjie retorted.

“I'll just have to find Friedental a blacksmith or a doctor,” he said with a mock sigh, opening the door to reveal a high pulpit in the front center with a high bench on either side.

“The benches are for deacons,” Ansjie said somewhat airily. “More bench than deacons, but, of course, the village will grow. In the three years since we came, there've been eighteen children born.” She pointed out the rail where the
Vorsingers,
or hymn leaders, stood, and Conrad added that the building was also used as a meeting house and that he taught classes here.

“Elder Goerz schools the young ones in Bible and church history,” he explained. “Ansjie teaches penmanship, and I do the best I can with English, arithmetic, geography, and what little I've learned about the United States.”

“Perhaps I could help with that,” Deborah offered. “I'm no scholar, but Father—” Her voice faltered; for a little while, she'd
forgotten,
really forgotten, except for a shadow at the back of her mind. “Father talked a lot about our history and what caused things that're happening now.”

“Good.” Conrad's voice was warmly pleased. “I must discuss it with the council; I'm sure they'll be glad. Before we left Prussia, it was agreed that though they wished to practice their religion and retain the use of German, they should try to be good Americans, too, and encourage their children to learn English. As the Territory fills up, Friedental will have closer neighbors and must prepare for that.”

Next they visited the communal barns, where the village herd was milked. The lofts were filled with hay and there was a partitioned room for separating the milk and letting the cream rise. Each family got as much milk as it needed, and part of the village business was seeing to a fair distribution of dairy-connected chores from haying to churning. Conrad and a committee had searched Missouri and Arkansas for good cows and bought the best they could locate, mostly fawn-colored Jerseys.

“As the herd increases, we'll keep the best and sell or butcher the others,” Conrad said. “As new towns spring up, we can sell the extra cheese and butter we should have by then.”

They left the barn as the cows were coming in to be milked. Conrad introduced Deborah to the bearded men who apparently were that night's milkers. The youngest, crimsoning, choked a greeting to Ansjie, who tossed her head and answered grudgingly.

“Poor Dietrich,” Conrad said when they were out of earshot. “You're hard on him, Ansjie.”

“Not as hard as his mother would be if I let him get any foolish notions,” she retorted. “Have I reproached you because every girl over fifteen finds excuses to come to our house or drop by school when you're teaching?”

She stalked down the lane ahead of them for a few minutes, but she slowed as Deborah admired the pigs. These were very clean, pink skin showing through coarse white or spotted hair. Their sod sties were neatly thatched and a hedge formed a large enclosure for them with a small stream from the creak running through it.

“Pigs are tidy,” Ansjie said. “People make them dirty by putting them in little pens where all becomes muck.” She gazed pridefully at the animals that had trotted over, squealing. “These get lots of skim milk and all the scraps of the village. In the fall, enough are butchered for everyone and the meat is divided up. We eat well at Friedental.”

“Don't coyotes ever get piglets or chickens and geese?” asked Deborah, for every house had a chicken coop and hedged pen.

“The men take turns patrolling on summer nights, and in winter all the creatures are shut up before dark. We loose a few geese and chickens; not many.”

They walked back through the orchards, Conrad pointing out apples, cherries, peaches, pears, apricots, and plums. He touched the reddish bark of one young cherry tree. “I hope they will bear fruit this year.” His eyes met Deborah's through the bare, dead-seeming branches. “But one must have patience. The leaves will be beautiful.”

Ansjie sniffed. “One can't eat leaves.”

He was still watching Deborah. “No. But one can see them and be glad.”

“Not unless the stomach is filled with something else! Which reminds me that it's time for
Abendbrot!
As soon as the chickens and geese have theirs!”

Supper was delicious smoked sausage, rye bread and butter, cheese-thickened cauliflower soup, and tea flavored with spice. Conrad worked at accounts till the women had done the dishes, then moved his desk chair over by the cushioned ones near the stove. Ansjie lit the three tall candles and settled in the chair beside a knitting basket.

“Won't you sit with us?” Conrad invited, indicating what was obviously his accustomed place. “We read and talk in the evenings.”

“
You
read and talk,” said Ansjie. “
I
knit or mend.”

“I'd enjoy listening,” Deborah said. “But I'd like to have my hands busy. Is there something I could knit or mend, Ansjie?”

“Socks!” exclaimed Ansjie. “There are always needed socks! Several of the women have so much to do that they can't keep their children's feet covered, and so the rest of us help. We also knit for Peter Voth, who's a widower.”

“But doing his best, poor fellow, to win a bride,” put in Conrad roguishly.

Disdaining to answer, Ansjie produced a pair of bone needles and a ball of gray wool yarn. “You could do socks that would fit you for the middle children of Lorenz Schroeder, the shoemaker,” she suggested.

Deborah set to work. Conrad opened the book. “This is one of your poets,” he said. “I like him very much. Walt Whitman—”

The needles dropped from Deborah's fingers. “Oh, no! We—my family read, too. We were reading
Leaves of Grass
just the night before—”

Ansjie came and held her, stroking her hair. “There, there,
mein kind!
” she soothed. “Maybe it's better we don't read for a while, Conrad. You could sing instead or play your violin.”

“Whatever Deborah wishes,” he nodded.

Using the handkerchief Ansjie offered, Deborah managed a shaky smile. “I'm glad you read. It does make me remember, but it's a good memory. Only I—I can't hear Whitman yet.”

Conrad rose and went over to his desk. “I've been Englishing some of Friedrich Rückert, my favorite modern poet. I haven't tried for rhyme, but to my mind he says some things better than anyone else has. Shall I read from him?”