Blessing in Disguise Read online

  Bridget scratched a mosquito bite, set to itching by the trickle of perspiration that meandered down her neck.

  “I’ll go check with Gunnar and make sure there hasn’t been any trouble on the line,” Hjelmer said.

  Just that summer they’d gotten a real telegraph office in Blessing. The operator, Gunnar Erickson, took over a corner part of the sack house. Surely Augusta would have sent them a telegraph if there was a problem. If she thought of it. If she had enough money. The ifs were as irritating as the black flies. He brushed one away and blinked in the dimness of the building after the brilliance of the morning sun.

  “Hey, Erickson,” he called as he drew closer to the telegraph office.

  “Ja, vat you vant?” Pushing his green visor up on his shiny bald head, the man turned from his machine.

  Hjelmer leaned on the window ledge. “You heard anything about problems on the lines from New York? My sister was supposed to be on this train, and she wasn’t.”

  “None. Leastways nothing come through here. Anyting of any importance vould be passed on.”

  “Just thought I’d check.” Hjelmer rubbed his chin, all the while shaking his head. “She’ll probably be here tomorrow with a wild tale of mix-ups. Sure wish she’d listened to me and all the others and learned some English.”

  “Anyone traveling wit her?” Gunnar asked.

  Again Hjelmer shook his head. Leave it to Augusta. As the eldest daughter, she’d always been extra sure of herself, as if she knew more than the younger ones. And since he’d been one of the two youngest, he, as well as Katy, had learned to stay out of her way when she got on a tear.

  But he’d never wished anything bad on her. And right now all the traveling tales he’d heard, some of which he’d experienced himself, were coming home to roost. “Takk.” Hjelmer started to leave, then turned back. “Let me know if you hear anything, okay?”

  “Ja, sure.” Gunnar went back to his machines, and Hjelmer headed for the boardinghouse. Dinner would be in full swing right about now, but he knew his mother needed every bit of good news he could dredge up.

  “Thank the Lord for that,” Bridget said as soon as he finished telling her.

  “We’ll see her on the train in the morning, you just watch.” Hjelmer hoped he sounded more confident than he felt. If she didn’t show and didn’t wire, he could be sure he would be the one sent to find her. Talk about a wild-goose chase.

  “You want to eat?” Bridget gestured to the table set up in the kitchen for family and help to eat at after the guests were served.

  “No thanks. Penny will be waiting for me. Don’t worry, Mor, all right?”

  Bridget leveled a gaze at him that reminded him of when he was young. “Hjelmer, I don’t worry. I let God do that. After all, He never sleeps anyway.”

  The twinkle in her faded blue eyes cheered him up again. So many times he had heard her say those very words. Surely she must believe them or she’d not say them. Surely.

  Now, if only he could adopt her strong faith. The thought of what losing another daughter, this so soon after Katy, might do to his mother was more than he cared to contemplate. Or what it would do to all the rest of them either.

  He waved to Goodie and Ilse as he left through the dining room and crossed back to the general store, which was owned by his wife, Penny, not by him, as so many people thought at first. The blacksmith shop next door was his, and he also managed the First Bank of Blessing, which occupied a room off the store. Sam Lincoln, a Negro he had met working the railroad, now did most of the blacksmithing, and Anner Valders most of the bank work, since Hjelmer had been elected to the Constitutional Congress for North Dakota. Lately he’d been gone much more than he’d been home.

  “Dinner’s ready, soon as you wash up,” Penny said as he entered the back door. She turned from stirring something on the stove and gave him a smile that chased away his worries. He crossed the room to drop a kiss on the back of her neck on the way to the washbasin.

  “While it smells mighty good in here, you smell even better.” He inhaled and kissed her again.

  “Hjelmer, someone might come in.”

  “Let them.” He ran a tender finger down the slight groove in the back of her slender neck.

  “That tickles.”

  He could hear that slightly breathless tenor of her voice, the one that made him feel as though he could conquer the world. She leaned back against him and turned her face up to meet his lips, her long lashes sweeping down over eyes of gray or blue, depending on her mood. Today they sparkled azure as high mountain lakes in the spring.

  “You taste even better than you smell.” He whispered the words against lips that had gone soft beneath his. While she came barely up to his chin, her slender body housed a character strong enough to run her own store and a heart big enough to help make sure no one in the Blessing area went without the necessities. She could charm the quilting women of the church into fighting for women’s rights and cause her husband to dream dreams that brought him home again as soon as he could possibly manage.

  Like now. Her fragrance teased his senses as his lips teased hers.

  “Aren’t you hungry?” She kissed him again.

  “Um.”

  “Anybody here?” The call came from the store. Neither had heard the bell over the door jingle.

  Penny shook her head. “Just when this was getting interesting. Where do you suppose Ephraim has gone? He said he’d mind the store.”

  “I’ll take care of the store while you put the dinner on the table.” Hjelmer patted her behind as he stepped back. “We’ll have to pick this up again—later?”

  Penny could feel the flame up her neck, and she knew it wasn’t the stove. Perhaps this would be the time. She’d been praying for a baby ever since they were married, but more than three years had passed, and God still hadn’t seen fit to open her womb. The thought of being barren gave her nightmares more times than she cared to count.

  As soon as Hjelmer returned, she set a platter of fried chicken on the table next to the bowl of potatoes and went back for the gravy. “So what did you find out from Erickson?”

  “Nothing.” Hjelmer took his seat and tucked the napkin into the neck of his shirt to protect it from grease splatters. He really should have changed first. “He said he hasn’t heard a thing about problems on the rail lines. Mor says she isn’t worrying, but she’s—”

  “Letting God do that.” Penny finished his sentence for him.

  “That’s fine for her. I’m worrying enough for both of us.”

  “Hjelmer, so Augusta missed a train. That can happen to anyone. If one was late somewhere—”

  “I know. I’ve given myself all the rational arguments, but something about this really bothers me.”

  Penny took her chair and laid her hand on his. “Would you say the grace?”

  They bowed their heads, and after asking the blessing on the food, Hjelmer added, “And please, heavenly Father, bring Augusta here on tomorrow’s train.” Penny joined him in the “amen” and passed him the chicken.

  School had let out for the day, and the mail had been sorted into the named slots on the wall, so things were quieting down again when Olaf Wold, Kaaren’s uncle and manager of the sack house, came in the store. Penny looked up from her order pad. “Onkel Olaf, good to see you.”

  “Not so good, I think, Penny. Is Hjelmer around?”

  “Back helping Sam with something, I believe. I’ll call him.” Before the man could answer she darted to the back door and called her husband. When he didn’t answer right away, she stepped down to the stoop. “Hjelmer!”

  “What?”

  She could tell he was in the smithy, so she raised her voice and called him again.

  “I’m coming.”

  As soon as he stepped outside, she beckoned him with a flurry of her hand. “Hurry.”

  Hjelmer broke into a trot. “What is it?”

  “Olaf is here, and I got a feeling something is bad wrong.”

>   Hjelmer followed her into the store to find Olaf studying the Grand Forks Herald that Penny had taken to pinning to the wall.

  “What is it?” Hjelmer got right to the point after the greeting.

  “Well, you know that when the train comes in, the baggage handlers cart everything into the sack house and people pick up their belongings there?”

  “Ja.” Hjelmer wished Olaf would talk faster but knew that wasn’t the way of the man.

  “Well, we were all kind of busy about then, what with waiting for your sister and all . . .” Olaf shook his head. “I just now got to checking on what was left, and I found a small trunk.” He paused.

  “A small trunk.” Hjelmer leaned forward. “And?”

  “And, well, the trunk has your sister’s name on it. Augusta Bjorklund, clear as you please.”

  Hjelmer closed his eyes, but when he opened them again, the look on Olaf ’s face hadn’t changed. Neither had his pronouncement. Augusta’s trunk sat in the sack house. So where in thunderation was Augusta?

  “You want I should go tell Bridget?”

  Hjelmer thought quickly. “No, I think not. No need to get her all worried tonight. Surely Augusta will be here on the first train in the morning, and then Mor would have worried for nothing.”

  “If you think so.” But the look on Olaf ’s face shouted his disagreement louder than any words.

  “Ja, I think that is best.” Hjelmer wasn’t sure if he was trying to convince Olaf or himself.

  “I don’t know,” Penny said after Olaf left the store. “I think Bridget would want to know right off. At least I would.”

  “Ja, well, she’s not your mother, and . . .” He stopped at the wounded look in her eyes. Taking a deep breath, he spoke more softly. “I’m sorry, Penny, I just think this is best.” He shook his head again. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Well, your mor would start to pray and ask everyone else to pray too. She would remind God that He promises to take care of his chicks and lambs and that He needs to get right on this one.”

  Hjelmer halfway turned his head and watched her from the corner of his eye, a smile making his eyes crinkle around the edges. “You sound so much like her, I swear I would have thought she walked right into this room. I know Mor says she doesn’t worry, that she lets God handle that, but this is her only remaining daughter, and”—he rubbed his temples with the forefinger of each hand—“I don’t want to be the one who tells her, that is for certain sure.”

  “Let’s go do it now together.”

  Hjelmer shook his head. “Let me finish that poker out in the smithy, and I’ll take her that at the same time. After supper would be a better time, I think.”

  The bell over the door tinkled, and Penny put a smile on her face for the customer. “Why, Pastor Solberg, what brings you in?”

  “Good afternoon, Penny. I need the mail, and Mary Martha needs a packet of needles.” He glanced over at the half wheel of cheese under a glass cover. “I’ll take a wedge of that too.” He spread his fingers about three inches apart. “About this big.”

  “So how is school going?” Penny handed him the mail from his slot on the back wall and took out a knife to cut the cheese.

  “Good. Seems strange to have started so early this year, but now that we’re almost a state, we have to abide by more rules. The big boys are still out helping with harvest, so I have extra time for the little ones. I think that Andrew is going to be as smart as his big brother. My, the things he comes up with.”

  “Those two sure are different, though.” Penny set the wedge of cheese on a piece of brown paper. “Anything else?”

  Solberg leaned closer, lowering his voice. He nodded toward the sewing center in the west end of the store. “I want to buy Mary Martha one of the machines for Christmas. What do you think?”

  “I think she’ll throw her arms around you and kiss you silly.”

  “Penny Bjorklund!” John Solberg stepped back and stared at her, his eyes wide and red creeping up his neck.

  “Oh, pshaw, as my tante Agnes says.” Penny chuckled. “You’re married now. You got to get used to a bit of teasing.”

  “I know, but . . .” He fanned his face with the two letters in his hand. “You caught me by surprise, that’s all.” He looked back at the Singer sewing machine atop its cabinet. “You think she’ll like it, then?”

  “Yes, I know she’ll like it. And then she won’t need to come and use mine.” Penny nearly bit her tongue. Please, God, don’t let him ask why she’s using my machine. Mary Martha had special-ordered some fine black wool and was sewing her husband a new suit for Christmas. Even with the sewing machine, the garment was only slowly taking shape.

  The bell tinkled, and Solberg turned to see who had arrived.

  Penny breathed a sigh of relief and sent her thanks heavenward.

  “Ah, there you are, Pastor. I went by your house first, and Mrs. Solberg said you were here.” Mrs. Valders wiped the back of her hand across her forehead. “Sure is warm for September, don’t you think?”

  “That it is. Is there something I can do for you?” Pastor Solberg picked up his brown-wrapped packet of cheese.

  “Yes. It’s about the letter you sent home with the boys.” She shook her head. “Those two.” But her smile had the hesitancy one wore at the prospect of bad news.

  But at the same time Penny could see a slight glint of pride in the woman’s eyes. She and her husband, Anner Valders, who helped Hjelmer with the banking, had adopted two boys who had hitched rides on trains clear from New York City. They had slipped off the train in Blessing to steal something to eat and got caught in the store. Toby and Jerry White Valders had a well-earned reputation for causing trouble.

  “Well, I warned them about chasing the little girls with a garter snake, and instead of administering the paddle, I said I would write you a letter.”

  “I know what the letter said. Did anyone get hurt?” Hildegunn Valders rolled her eyes and straightened her shoulders.

  “No, but the boys need to learn more kindness for others, so I wanted to talk with you and Mr. Valders about what we could do to help them learn that.” When she started to say something, he raised a hand. “I know they have had a hard life until now, and that is why I believe we both need to pray for them and think of ways to help them become the fine young men God meant for them to be.”

  Penny wanted to ask how the snake had fared, but she kept her thoughts to herself. She remembered the times she’d been the one chased and had her pigtails pulled by an older boy.

  “So if you and Mr. Valders would bring the boys by my home one of these evenings, I think we should all sit down and have a talk. Don’t you agree?”

  “I . . . I guess.” Mrs. Valders turned to Penny. “Could I please have our mail?”

  “Here you go.” Penny fetched the envelope and handed it across the counter. “Sure seems strange without Anner here.”

  “I know. At home too, but he should be back tomorrow or the next day. That meeting had better have been a good one. Land sakes, going clear to Bismarck to help with the banking laws.” She nodded to both Penny and the pastor, then sailed out the door.

  “So where was Andrew during all this?” Penny asked Pastor Solberg as soon as Hildegunn was out the door.

  “Locked in Thorliff ’s arms. He was going to take a stick, a big stick, to both of those boys for scaring Ellie and Deborah.”

  “I can just imagine.” Penny had no trouble picturing Andrew on the warpath. “What did you do?”

  “Toby and Jerry spent the afternoon splitting and stacking wood. And I sent the letter home. I almost took out the paddle, but I’ve never believed that is necessary for a good education. Might have to change my opinion, though, with those two.” He sighed and shook his head. “I’ll be back to fill out the paper work on that sewing machine.”

  “Good. We’ll be ready.”

  Solberg turned back. “Any word on Miss Bjorklund?”

  Penny shook her head. “B
ut her trunk is here.”

  “Oh dear. How is Bridget?”

  “We’re going to talk with her again after supper.”

  “If it isn’t one thing, it’s another. I’ll be praying for that young woman’s safety.”

  Penny walked with him to the door and turned the sign to “Closed” as he left. Now to get some supper on the table.

  Lamps were lit by the time she and Hjelmer had made their way to the boardinghouse. They found Bridget sitting in her rocking chair on the back porch while the others were finishing the cleanup in the kitchen.

  “Are you all right, Mor?” Hjelmer asked after closing the screen door behind him.

  “Ja, just needed a few breaths of cooler air.” Bridget put her knitting back in the basket at her feet and looked up at her son. “Why is it you are here?”

  Hjelmer sighed. “I have something to tell you.”

  “I figured that. What is it?”

  “Olaf found Augusta’s trunk in the sack house several hours after the train left. The baggage carriers left it there.”

  “So . . . so how could that be? Where . . . where is Augusta?”

  “I wish I knew. I only wish I knew.”

  Bridget rocked for a few minutes, then looked up at her son. “You must go and find her.”

  “Mor . . . I . . . ah . . . we . . .” He looked to Penny for assistance, but she shrugged and shook her head.

  “Perhaps she’ll be here in the morning.”

  “If she’s not, you will have to go look.”

  Penny felt her stomach lurch. How were they ever going to have a baby if Hjelmer was never home? Where in the whole country of America was Augusta?

  Chapter 8

  Between Ipswich and Kane’s Ranch

  September 1

  Augusta had never seen such hail.

  “Come on!” Only Kane’s hand on her arm pulling her with him told her what he wanted. They clambered over the side of the wagon, and she followed him under the long wooden bed. Then motioning her to stay, he crawled out to unhook the traces from the singletrees, and then with icy fingers he unhooked the wagon tongue and brought the horses around to tie them to the wheels.