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_ Emil reached home a little past noon, and when he went into the
kitchen Alexandra was already seated at the head of the long table,
having dinner with her men, as she always did unless there were
visitors. He slipped into his empty place at his sister's right.
The three pretty young Swedish girls who did Alexandra's housework
were cutting pies, refilling coffeecups, placing platters of bread
and meat and potatoes upon the red tablecloth, and continually
getting in each other's way between the table and the stove. To be
sure they always wasted a good deal of time getting in each other's
way and giggling at each other's mistakes. But, as Alexandra had
pointedly told her sisters-in-law, it was to hear them giggle that
she kept three young things in her kitchen; the work she could
do herself, if it were necessary. These girls, with their long
letters from home, their finery, and their love-affairs, afforded
her a great deal of entertainment, and they were company for her
when Emil was away at school.
Of the youngest girl, Signa, who has a pretty figure, mottled pink
cheeks, and yellow hair, Alexandra is very fond, though she keeps
a sharp eye upon her. Signa is apt to be skittish at mealtime, when
the men are about, and to spill the coffee or upset the cream. It
is supposed that Nelse Jensen, one of the six men at the dinner-table,
is courting Signa, though he has been so careful not to commit
himself that no one in the house, least of all Signa, can tell
just how far the matter has progressed. Nelse watches her glumly
as she waits upon the table, and in the evening he sits on a bench
behind the stove with his DRAGHARMONIKA, playing mournful airs
and watching her as she goes about her work. When Alexandra asked
Signa whether she thought Nelse was in earnest, the poor child hid
her hands under her apron and murmured, "I don't know, ma'm. But
he scolds me about everything, like as if he wanted to have me!"
At Alexandra's left sat a very old man, barefoot and wearing a long
blue blouse, open at the neck. His shaggy head is scarcely whiter
than it was sixteen years ago, but his little blue eyes have become
pale and watery, and his ruddy face is withered, like an apple that
has clung all winter to the tree. When Ivar lost his land through
mismanagement a dozen years ago, Alexandra took him in, and he has
been a member of her household ever since. He is too old to work
in the fields, but he hitches and unhitches the work-teams and
looks after the health of the stock. Sometimes of a winter evening
Alexandra calls him into the sitting-room to read the Bible aloud
to her, for he still reads very well. He dislikes human habitations,
so Alexandra has fitted him up a room in the barn, where he is very
comfortable, being near the horses and, as he says, further from
temptations. No one has ever found out what his temptations are.
In cold weather he sits by the kitchen fire and makes hammocks
or mends harness until it is time to go to bed. Then he says his
prayers at great length behind the stove, puts on his buffalo-skin
coat and goes out to his room in the barn.
Alexandra herself has changed very little. Her figure is fuller,
and she has more color. She seems sunnier and more vigorous than
she did as a young girl. But she still has the same calmness and
deliberation of manner, the same clear eyes, and she still wears
her hair in two braids wound round her head. It is so curly that
fiery ends escape from the braids and make her head look like one
of the big double sunflowers that fringe her vegetable garden.
Her face is always tanned in summer, for her sunbonnet is oftener
on her arm than on her head. But where her collar falls away from
her neck, or where her sleeves are pushed back from her wrist, the
skin is of such smoothness and whiteness as none but Swedish women
ever possess; skin with the freshness of the snow itself.
Alexandra did not talk much at the table, but she encouraged her
men to talk, and she always listened attentively, even when they
seemed to be talking foolishly.
To-day Barney Flinn, the big red-headed Irishman who had been with
Alexandra for five years and who was actually her foreman, though
he had no such title, was grumbling about the new silo she had put
up that spring. It happened to be the first silo on the Divide,
and Alexandra's neighbors and her men were skeptical about it. "To
be sure, if the thing don't work, we'll have plenty of feed without
it, indeed," Barney conceded.
Nelse Jensen, Signa's gloomy suitor, had his word. "Lou, he says
he wouldn't have no silo on his place if you'd give it to him.
He says the feed outen it gives the stock the bloat. He heard of
somebody lost four head of horses, feedin' 'em that stuff."
Alexandra looked down the table from one to another. "Well,
the only way we can find out is to try. Lou and I have different
notions about feeding stock, and that's a good thing. It's bad if
all the members of a family think alike. They never get anywhere.
Lou can learn by my mistakes and I can learn by his. Isn't that
fair, Barney?"
The Irishman laughed. He had no love for Lou, who was always uppish
with him and who said that Alexandra paid her hands too much. "I've
no thought but to give the thing an honest try, mum. 'T would be
only right, after puttin' so much expense into it. Maybe Emil will
come out an' have a look at it wid me." He pushed back his chair,
took his hat from the nail, and marched out with Emil, who, with
his university ideas, was supposed to have instigated the silo.
The other hands followed them, all except old Ivar. He had been
depressed throughout the meal and had paid no heed to the talk of
the men, even when they mentioned cornstalk bloat, upon which he
was sure to have opinions.
"Did you want to speak to me, Ivar?" Alexandra asked as she rose
from the table. "Come into the sitting-room."
The old man followed Alexandra, but when she motioned him to a chair
he shook his head. She took up her workbasket and waited for him
to speak. He stood looking at the carpet, his bushy head bowed,
his hands clasped in front of him. Ivar's bandy legs seemed to
have grown shorter with years, and they were completely misfitted
to his broad, thick body and heavy shoulders.
"Well, Ivar, what is it?" Alexandra asked after she had waited
longer than usual.
Ivar had never learned to speak English and his Norwegian was quaint
and grave, like the speech of the more old-fashioned people. He
always addressed Alexandra in terms of the deepest respect, hoping
to set a good example to the kitchen girls, whom he thought too
familiar in their manners.
"Mistress," he began faintly, without raising his eyes, "the folk
have been looking coldly at me of late. You know there has been
talk."
"Talk about what, Ivar?"
"About sending me away; to the asylum."
Alexandra put down her sewing-basket. "Nobody has come to me with
such talk," she said decidedly. "Why need you listen? You know
I would never consent to such a thing."
Ivar lifted his shaggy head and looked at her out of his little
eyes. "They say that you cannot prevent it if the folk complain of
me, if your brothers complain to the authorities. They say that
your brothers are afraid--God forbid!--that I may do you some
injury when my spells are on me. Mistress, how can any one think
that?--that I could bite the hand that fed me!" The tears trickled
down on the old man's beard.
Alexandra frowned. "Ivar, I wonder at you, that you should come
bothering me with such nonsense. I am still running my own house,
and other people have nothing to do with either you or me. So long
as I am suited with you, there is nothing to be said."
Ivar pulled a red handkerchief out of the breast of his blouse and
wiped his eyes and beard. "But I should not wish you to keep me
if, as they say, it is against your interests, and if it is hard
for you to get hands because I am here."
Alexandra made an impatient gesture, but the old man put out his
hand and went on earnestly:--
"Listen, mistress, it is right that you should take these things
into account. You know that my spells come from God, and that
I would not harm any living creature. You believe that every one
should worship God in the way revealed to him. But that is not
the way of this country. The way here is for all to do alike. I
am despised because I do not wear shoes, because I do not cut my
hair, and because I have visions. At home, in the old country,
there were many like me, who had been touched by God, or who had
seen things in the graveyard at night and were different afterward.
We thought nothing of it, and let them alone. But here, if a man
is different in his feet or in his head, they put him in the asylum.
Look at Peter Kralik; when he was a boy, drinking out of a creek,
he swallowed a snake, and always after that he could eat only
such food as the creature liked, for when he ate anything else, it
became enraged and gnawed him. When he felt it whipping about in
him, he drank alcohol to stupefy it and get some ease for himself.
He could work as good as any man, and his head was clear, but they
locked him up for being different in his stomach. That is the way;
they have built the asylum for people who are different, and they
will not even let us live in the holes with the badgers. Only
your great prosperity has protected me so far. If you had had
ill-fortune, they would have taken me to Hastings long ago."
As Ivar talked, his gloom lifted. Alexandra had found that she
could often break his fasts and long penances by talking to him
and letting him pour out the thoughts that troubled him. Sympathy
always cleared his mind, and ridicule was poison to him.
"There is a great deal in what you say, Ivar. Like as not they
will be wanting to take me to Hastings because I have built a silo;
and then I may take you with me. But at present I need you here.
Only don't come to me again telling me what people say. Let people
go on talking as they like, and we will go on living as we think
best. You have been with me now for twelve years, and I have gone
to you for advice oftener than I have ever gone to any one. That
ought to satisfy you."
Ivar bowed humbly. "Yes, mistress, I shall not trouble you with
their talk again. And as for my feet, I have observed your wishes
all these years, though you have never questioned me; washing them
every night, even in winter."
Alexandra laughed. "Oh, never mind about your feet, Ivar. We can
remember when half our neighbors went barefoot in summer. I expect
old Mrs. Lee would love to slip her shoes off now sometimes, if
she dared. I'm glad I'm not Lou's mother-in-law."
Ivar looked about mysteriously and lowered his voice almost to a
whisper. "You know what they have over at Lou's house? A great
white tub, like the stone water-troughs in the old country, to wash
themselves in. When you sent me over with the strawberries, they
were all in town but the old woman Lee and the baby. She took me
in and showed me the thing, and she told me it was impossible to
wash yourself clean in it, because, in so much water, you could
not make a strong suds. So when they fill it up and send her in
there, she pretends, and makes a splashing noise. Then, when they
are all asleep, she washes herself in a little wooden tub she keeps
under her bed."
Alexandra shook with laughter. "Poor old Mrs. Lee! They won't let
her wear nightcaps, either. Never mind; when she comes to visit
me, she can do all the old things in the old way, and have as much
beer as she wants. We'll start an asylum for old-time people,
Ivar."
Ivar folded his big handkerchief carefully and thrust it back into
his blouse. "This is always the way, mistress. I come to you
sorrowing, and you send me away with a light heart. And will you
be so good as to tell the Irishman that he is not to work the brown
gelding until the sore on its shoulder is healed?"
"That I will. Now go and put Emil's mare to the cart. I am going
to drive up to the north quarter to meet the man from town who is
to buy my alfalfa hay." _
Read next: PART II - Neighboring Fields: Chapter 3
Read previous: PART II - Neighboring Fields: Chapter 1
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