The Measure of Katie Calloway,: A Novel (12 page)

Looking back, she believed that the moment when she had left her picnic behind and turned her back so Mose could run was one of the few truly fine things she had ever done in her life. With all her heart, she wished she had been strong and brave and smart enough to have done more.

Now, it was
her
eyes that pled for silence. And it was Mose, after his initial surprise, who silently turned away.

Like most camp owners, Robert had built the bunkhouse without windows. There was no need to go to the expense and bother of transporting and installing panes of glass for the long building. Winter days in Michigan were short. The men living in this shanty would be awake and at work long before daylight. They wouldn’t come back to the bunkhouse until after dark.

A long seat called a “deacon’s bench” made of split logs ran around the inside of the room, flush against the bunks. In the middle, a barrel stove squatted in a box of sand with its stovepipe shooting straight up through an open hole in the roof. The stovepipe funneled some of the smoke out, and the hole let fresh air in. After men’s intestines had absorbed the full effect of eating meals consisting of beans and bacon, the bunkhouse was always in need of a little fresh air.

There were twenty double bunks made of rough-sawn pine lining the walls. Each was built to hold two men. It was common for strangers who might not even speak the same language to sleep two to a bunk. They slept fully clothed, cushioned by sawdust or straw, doubling up their blankets, and kept from freezing by sharing body warmth. He would have a crew of thirty, so he had room to keep a bunk to himself. His personal supply of wool blankets was thick enough that he thought he could survive the winter without a bunk partner.

Several of the men lined the deacon’s bench. Some lay in bunks. The logger from Maine was sharpening his axe on the grindstone that sat in the middle of the floor. Ernie, one of the few men who favored a mustache instead of a beard, scraped at his jaw with his own newly sharpened axe blade. Cletus was carving something that looked like a miniature horse. A Dutchman named Klaas was hanging his wet socks with all the others over the stove on a wire that stretched the length of the bunkhouse. Soon, the socks would begin to steam and add their own ripe aroma to the smoke and sweat.

Henri, one of the new men, was sitting cross-legged on a top bunk, his back against the wall, his eyes closed, playing a soft tune on his fiddle. Come Saturday night, the tune would become more raucous, but this was a work night and there would be no dancing and singing.

Skypilot was lying in his top bunk, reading a ragged Bible by the light of a kerosene lamp hanging from the ceiling. This behavior was out of the norm. Few shanty boys owned a Bible, let alone read one.

“So—you think you’re a preacher.” Sam sat on the deacon’s bench, picking his teeth and watching Skypilot with mild curiosity.

Skypilot licked his finger and turned a page. “Nope.”

“That’s what Ernie and Cletus said.”

“Ernie and Cletus were wrong.”

“If you ain’t a preacher,” Sam said suspiciously, “then how come they call you Skypilot?”

Skypilot kept his eyes on the page. “Because I used to be a preacher.”

“How can anyone used to be a preacher?” Sam probed. “Either you are or you ain’t.”

“Not if you get fired, you’re not.”

“You got fired? From a
church
?”

Skypilot sighed and put his finger in the Bible to mark his place. “Yes.”

“What in thunder did you do, man?”

“I was not happy about the institution of slavery.”

“A lot of us up here in the North weren’t,” Sam scoffed.

“I wasn’t in the North.” Skypilot laid his Bible on his chest, folded his arms behind his head, and stared at the ceiling. “I was living in Richmond.”

“Wait a minute. You mean you were trying to be an abolitionist right smack dab in the capital of the Confederacy?” Sam’s jaw hung open. Henri’s fiddle playing stopped. All paused to stare at Skypilot.

“I preached some sermons against it, yes. I thought there were things that reasonable Christian people ought to think about before they started shooting at each other. But according to my father-in-law-to-be, I was a ‘fire-breathing, dyed-in-the-wool, wild-eyed, raving lunatic’ who was trying to destroy him and everything he held dear.”

“Then what happened?” Sam asked.

“It got my dander up. Within twenty-four hours of a sermon in which I compared my father-in-law and others like him to the Pharaoh who tried to keep Moses and the Hebrew children in slavery, my engagement to his daughter was cut off and the leaders of the church gave me the boot.”

“What did you do then?” Cletus’s eyes were huge.

“I lived up to my former fiancée’s father’s low opinion of me by escorting over fifty slaves across the Ohio River and I made certain that several were his.”

“How come you’re an axe man now?”

“I put myself through Bible college on one season of timber-cutting at a time. I’d work a year and go to school a year. Took me a while.”

“We ran two preachers out of my camp last year.” Sam spat a stream of tobacco juice into the sand beneath the stove. “You planning on tryin’ any of that convertin’ stuff on us?”

“Nope.”

Sam leaned back against the deacon’s bench. “How come?”

“Here.” Skypilot tossed his Bible at Sam. “Read it for yourself. Make your own decision. I’m done with preaching.” Skypilot turned his back on Sam and faced the wall.

Sam gingerly laid the Bible on the deacon’s bench as though it might bite. “Think I’ll get some shut-eye.” He pulled off his shoes and crawled into his bunk.

“That woman cook.” The big logger from Maine spread his blanket on the bunk he had chosen. “She’s a widow?”

“Yes,” Robert answered.

“Pretty little thing.”

Sounds of affirmation came from around the bunkhouse. Robert kept quiet. So far, no one had said anything out of place. Katie
was
a pretty little thing, and she
was
a cook.

“A man could get used to having a woman like that around,” Mainer said.

More sounds of affirmation. Robert was glad now that he was sharing the bunkhouse with his men. He could keep the talk about Katie from spiraling downward.

Henri hung his fiddle on a peg on the wall. “Where is the girl from?”

“Ohio,” Robert said.

“That’s odd,” Tinker said. “There seems to be some Southern in her talk.”

“Ohio’s south of us.”

“Not that far south.”

“Do you think she’ll make flapjacks again for breakfast tomorrow?” Ernie asked.

“Or more of ’em fried potatoes,” Cletus said. “I love ’em fried potatoes.”

Robert relaxed. Their questions and comments were normal for a group of men whose interests lay, to a large extent, in what they put into their stomachs. He allowed himself to settle down in his bunk. Tomorrow morning would come soon enough. He hoped to start felling trees tomorrow.

As the men settled down for the night, Skypilot quietly climbed down out of his bunk, knelt beside the deacon’s bench, bowed his head, and began to pray. It wasn’t loud, and Robert couldn’t make out the words, but he could hear Skypilot’s voice softly conversing with God.

Out of the darkness, someone threw a shoe at the kneeling logger. It hit him square in the back. Skypilot stopped praying, picked up the shoe, looked at it, set it down, and resumed his prayer. A few moments later, another shoe came sailing out of the same bunk. Robert knew it was Sam doing it. This time, the shoe hit Skypilot in the back of the head. Again Skypilot picked up the shoe, looked at it, rubbed the back of his head, and slowly got to his feet.

“Now, Sam, why’d you have to go and do that for?” Skypilot said.

This time it was Sam’s wet, dirty sock that was flung, hitting Skypilot square in the face.

There was an intake of breath all around the bunkhouse as they waited to see what Skypilot would do. Almost reluctantly, Skypilot walked over, grabbed a fistful of Sam’s shirt, punched him twice in the face, then calmly went back to the deacon’s bench and resumed his prayer. This time, the bunkhouse remained silent. Nothing else was thrown, and Skypilot was allowed to finish in peace.

Robert went to sleep with a smile on his face. This camp was going to be a very interesting place this winter.

11

About four o’clock our noisy little cook

cries, “Boys, it is the break of day.”

With heavy sighs from slumber we rise

to go with the bright morning star.

“A Shantyman’s Life”
—1800s shanty song

October 10, 1867

A loud clatter awoke Katie from a sound sleep. It sounded as though the roof had fallen in. She lit the lamp beside her bed and checked her watch. It was a few minutes past two o’clock in the morning.

Finally! After several experiments, her makeshift alarm had worked. Never again would she be late for preparing breakfast. Never again would she have to rely on Jigger to awaken her.

She was smiling as she went to investigate the contraption she had rigged. The candle had burned to within an inch of the base, to where she had imbedded the string in the candle wax. The string, which had been tied to her bedpost and strung up over the rafter, had caught fire when the candle had burned down to the point she had marked after letting a similar candle burn through the previous night. This had released the old teakettle to plunge against the washtub she had turned upside down beneath it.

It had made a quite satisfying clatter. She was delighted with her own ingenuity.

“Is it time to get up?” Ned’s sleepy head emerged from beneath the covers.

“Go back to sleep, little brother,” she said. “I’m getting such an early start I won’t be needing your help this morning.”

Without argument, he snuggled back down beneath the covers.

Once again she had slept in her clothes, but that would stop after today. Now that she knew she wouldn’t have to rush around in the morning, she would take the time to put on a proper nightgown at night and brush and braid her hair instead of keeping it in a tight bun.

After putting a couple more logs into the stove, she splashed some water on her face, grabbed a shawl, and stepped out into the starry night. There was a sharper nip in the air than what had been there yesterday morning. If she wasn’t mistaken, there was even a scent of snow in the air.

She let herself into the cook shanty and began lighting the lamps that would illuminate the work area. Then she lit the tinder in the wood box and set the teakettle on to heat. The potatoes she had boiled last night after supper had cooled to the point that she could peel them to fry. The ham she had sliced yesterday, she layered into a large, covered pan and slid into the oven to heat.

Last of all, she set a vat of lard on the stove. This morning she would make doughnuts.
This
time she would taste the contents of the sugar jar to make certain it was sweet before dumping it into the batter.

There was something peaceful about working alone in the silence of this rough kitchen. There was something strengthening in knowing she was capable of making her own living. Something about the familiarity of the preparations for the men’s breakfast that made her feel strong and capable.

Deep in the recesses of her heart, she realized that she had made an important decision during that wild crying session in the cabin yesterday. She would never allow herself to be bullied again. From this moment forward, with the help of God, she would take control of her own life.

With the butcher knife held loosely in her hand, she walked over to Jigger’s room. She quietly turned the knob, then she kicked the door so hard it banged against the wall.

The light from the kitchen spilled into the room over her shoulder, illuminating the wild-eyed expression on Jigger’s face as he took in the fact that she was standing in his doorway with a sharp butcher knife in her hand. It took everything she had not to laugh when she saw the startled and fearful expression on his face.

“Time to get up, old man,” she said with satisfaction. “We have work to do.”

The doughnuts were perfect and plentiful. The fried potatoes crisp and golden. The ham was tender. The biscuits fluffy. The tea was strong and scalding hot. Katie surveyed her table with pride as the men shuffled through the door.

Then she spotted Mose again.

He seated himself next to Robert in the same place Jigger had assigned him. Ernie was sitting next to him. He wasn’t acting perturbed about being seated next to a black man—and she was grateful. Mose deserved the respect of the other men. More than any of them realized.

Once again, she studied Robert’s face for some sign that Mose had told him about her, but all she got was a morning nod.

“Pass the ’taters.”

“More sorghum.”

“Butter—down here.”

“Gimme more of ’em doughnuts.”

The sound of forks scraping plates, the occasional burp, and requests for food was all the noise allowed.

Still, the enthusiasm with which the men ate was really something.

The logger from Maine startled Katie when he broke the silence. “Best doughnuts I ever et in my life, ma’am.”

“No talking!” Jigger smacked the man on the back of the head. The logger gave Katie a wink before grabbing another fistful of doughnuts.

After the men had finished, she and Ned washed and dried the dishes and reset the table. When she went outside to dump the pan of dirty dishwater, it was still dark. Starlight and the dim glow of lantern light slanting out of the cook shanty windows illuminated her way to the edge of the camp.

She threw the dishwater into the brush that surrounded the camp and heard a disturbing, rustling sound, as though someone or something was walking through the brush.

“Who’s there?” she asked.

It seemed unlikely that a shanty boy would be skulking about in the morning darkness, but it didn’t sound like the footsteps of an animal. The hair of her neck stood up, and she backed away, holding the dishpan like a shield in front of her.

She had almost decided to turn tail and run into the kitchen when she caught a glimpse of a person emerging from the brush. She couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman, but whoever it was walked hunched over and had a pronounced limp. The only people she had ever seen move like that were old and feeble.

What would an elderly person be doing walking through these woods in the dark?

As the figure emerged from the shadows, she saw what appeared to be a woman dressed in rags. Her long hair hung in tangles, and her face—what Katie could see of it in the dim light—was so dirty she couldn’t begin to guess the woman’s age.

As the woman held out her hand, cupped, in a gesture of supplication, her sleeve fell away, and Katie saw that her arm was as thin as a stick of kindling.

“Who—who are you?” Katie backed away.

The woman looked like she might be an Indian.

It was cold outside. Katie didn’t know what else to do except open the door and allow her to enter. Maybe Jigger would know what to do with her.

The woman, Katie saw as they came into the lamplight of the cook shanty, was slight of build and much younger than Katie had first thought. Her limp seemed to come from an injured foot, and she was hunched over a bundle of clothing.

Ned’s eyes were as large as saucers as Katie seated the woman at the worktable, where the leftovers from the men’s breakfast lay. She pulled off the dishcloths with which she had covered the piles of food. The woman gasped, but she didn’t reach for the food. Instead, she first looked at Katie for permission.

Katie grabbed a tin plate and filled it. Ned rushed to pour a cup of lukewarm tea.

“Here,” Katie said. “Eat.”

The woman hesitated, still clinging to her bundle of rags. Katie reached to take it from her, but the woman resisted. Then, with the saddest eyes Katie had ever seen, she relinquished it to her. She immediately snatched a piece of ham from her plate and began to eat—chewing and swallowing but never taking her eyes off the bundle Katie had lifted from her arms.

Katie, unwilling to have the filthy rags in her clean kitchen, started to set the bundle in a far corner of the room but was startled by a weak mewling sound from within. She pulled a ragged corner away and saw the wizened face of a starving baby.

“Dear God,” she breathed. “Tell me what to do.”

With the mother watching every movement, she unwrapped the rags from the tiny, yellow infant—a little boy. What on earth was she going to feed him?

Jigger appeared in the doorway of his room. “What in tarnation?”

“They’re starving,” Katie said.

“They?” Jigger stalked toward her and the baby. The mother jumped up from the table and threw her body between Katie and Jigger.

“I ain’t gonna hurt your baby, woman.” He turned his palms up. “I just want to see it.”

Reluctantly, the woman moved away. She stood, wary and nervous, while he peered at the infant Katie held in her arms.

“Scrawny little thing, ain’t it?”

“What can we feed him?” Katie asked. “We don’t have a cow.”

“Don’t need a cow,” Jigger said. “Go get me a clean washrag, boy.”

Ned ran to get one of the cotton squares with which they washed dishes.

“Dip it in that pot of tea and wring it out good.”

Katie watched as her brother did as instructed. The mother, in the meantime, was eating fried potatoes by the handful, standing, never taking her eyes off her baby.

Ned brought the moistened cloth to Jigger, who scooped a small pile of sugar into the middle of it, and twisted it into a cone shape. Drops of sugary liquid appeared on the outside of the cloth.

“Here,” he said, sticking the pointed end of it into the baby’s mouth.

The infant began to suck, weakly. A tiny, birdlike claw of a hand closed around Jigger’s finger.

“He can’t live on sugar water,” Katie said.

“No, but it’ll buy him some time.” Jigger touched the tiny scrap of black hair on top of the baby’s head. “The mother might have some milk for him once she gets some food into her own gullet.”

The mother, now wolfing down biscuits, seemed to relax a little about the fact that two strange adults were hovering over her child.

A door slammed and Robert entered. “Katie,” he said. “I’m taking the men into the woods today. We’ll be cutting too far out to waste time coming back here for dinner. You’ll need to bring it out to . . .”

He stopped in his tracks as he saw the tableau before him. The woman cowered against a wall, watching him wild-eyed. Katie saw that she was grasping a butter knife.

“Looks like we got us a stray squaw and a starving baby,” Jigger explained. “Got any good milk cows handy?”

Robert came closer. The mother tensed even more as he approached the infant. Katie could tell that if he made one wrong move, the mother would spring at him—butter knife and all.

“May I look at your baby?” he asked in a soft voice. “I promise I won’t hurt it.” She stared at him a long moment, then she laid down the butter knife and returned to filling her stomach.

Robert reached for the ragged bundle.

Katie handed it over. “I—I don’t have much experience with babies.”

The makeshift sugar teat dislodged from the baby’s lips, and he began his pitiful mewling again.

“I do,” Robert said. “Where is the evaporated milk?”

“I put it in a cupboard,” Jigger said. “Your fancy cook here hasn’t seen fit to use it.”

“Evaporated milk?” Katie asked. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”