Jonathan felt good. He was lying beside Mary under the warm eiderdown comforter. The chill of early autumn that touched the air couldn’t touch him. He was full of plans. It had never occurred to Jonathan that the baby might be a girl. Whatever misgivings he may have had about the expected baby were all gone, replaced by hope.
Mary was still awake, he knew.
“Mary?” he said softly, but even so, she jumped. He wondered why she’d flinched like that and asked, “You okay?”
“Yes, Jonathan. What were you going to say?”
“With the money I earn in Dakota harvesting, I figure I can buy an Angus cow and start breeding a herd in the spring.”
It was the last thing in the world she expected him to say. All day long, since the scene in the churchyard, she’d been aware of the feeling generating in him, and she guessed it to be pride. She was baffled. Not once had he blamed her, acted jealous or hurt. How was she to generate any kind of feeling for him if he accepted her faithlessness so easily? She needed to feel loved enough by him to bring out the feelings any normal husband should feel. She had made an effort to please him in the past weeks, trying to recapture a sincere affection for him. But he seemed cold, and that coolness was reflected in her. She was prepared for him to say nearly anything but what he’d said.
“Buy a cow?” She sounded puzzled to Jonathan. And then she said a curious thing. “Could we talk about something important, Jonathan, just for once?”
He sensed an even deeper irritation in her than her voice held, and wondered what had brought it on.
“This is important, Mary. For the baby.”
“Ah, the baby!” she said with a quiver now quite discernible in her voice, “Now there’s an important item.”
“What is it you want me to say?” he asked.
“Whatever you want. Just say something.”
“All right.” He paused, searching for the words. “I’m happy about the baby.”
“How can you be happy, Jonathan?” she asked.
“Well, I reckon I’m happy ’cause the Lord saw fit…”
“The Lord! What about you, Jonathan?” She sat up and pounded her fists into the eiderdown.
Jonathan was unprepared for her sudden burst of anger and didn’t know how to deal with it, coming as it did so suddenly. Not knowing what she expected of him, he repeated her question, confused, “What about me?”
“Don’t you want an explanation, an apology?”
“I figure it’s best we don’t talk about it,” he mumbled.
“But Jonathan, what I did was wrong. I wronged you. Why don’t you blame me for that?”
“I said once I’d take the blame myself, and it’s between me and the Lord to straighten it out.”
“Leave the Lord out of this, Jonathan! This is about human beings and their feelings—yours and mine.”
“All right, Mary, but you’re making yourself too upset.”
“I am upset. I’m upset because my husband doesn’t care enough about me to be jealous.”
“Jealousy is a sin, Mary.”
“So is adultery.”
A verse from the Bible entered his mind then, but he wasn’t going to bring the Lord into this again. She was too worked up, and she had him confused, so he remained silent.
But she was insistent, demanding a response. “I said, so is adultery, Jonathan.”
He didn’t understand the reason for her anger. “I heard you, Mary. But I don’t know what you want out of me.”
“I want some jealousy, some reaction, some sign that you care. I want to talk about it.”
“The time for talking is past. Now it’s time to make plans.”
She sat, still and silent and angry, not knowing how to elicit from him feelings he apparently didn’t harbor.
“You know, Jonathan, that’s always been our trouble. We never talked about anything. I mean anything important. Like how you felt about needing a baby so bad. I knew it, but why couldn’t you say what you felt? And I wanted so many times to talk about what Doc Haymes says, but you’d get silent as a fence post if I’d bring it up. That’s not right. In order for two people to know each other, they’ve got to talk about the things you can’t see, not just those you can—like bulls and crops and fences and new barns! Don’t you see?”
“No, I don’t. You want me to talk about bein’ jealous when I ain’t, and about wantin’ a child when we’re gonna have one. You don’t make any sense. Besides, I’m not much for talkin’, anyway. You got Aaron for that.”
She couldn’t believe he’d say a thing like that now. Rather than try to work out an understanding, he’d go on as if nothing had changed.
“You’re my husband, the one I ought to talk with.”
“Well, we been talkin’ here, haven’t we?”
“Yes, in circles.”
“I don’t think you’re acting like yourself tonight. Maybe it’s being pregnant does it to you.”
She couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing. Only it wasn’t amused laughter, it was harsh, dry, hurt. But Jonathan didn’t even seem to understand her laughter. He reached up and pulled at her shoulder, saying, “Come on, lay down here and let’s forget it,” and she let him pull her back to her pillow and take her in his arms. Her anger was gone, and she was wondering what to do with the big, aching emptiness that was left in its stead. Jonathan’s hand on her breast did nothing to fill it. She lay still under the big, moving hand, waiting for some sweet, flooding emotion to begin at his caress, but none came. His petting gave her a feeling of vague revulsion, and she swallowed hard and made a soft sound behind her closed lips, which he mistook for passion.
Mary lay waiting. Waiting to discover whether she thought Jonathan did too much or not enough. His sudden mounting seemed no longer enough, yet it was more than she could bear. While his body worked against hers, she did what she’d vowed to herself she would never do, she imagined he was Aaron. She remembered the swirling, velvet releases of her climaxes with Aaron, but when her husband withdrew from her body, she was left with only that memory and a throbbing emptiness. She was afraid to ask herself if she desired that fullest draught of passion with Jonathan. Her answer might be that it was a pleasure she wanted only from Aaron, and from no other man.
16
Aaron could see his breath this morning, and the chill October air made the ax handle cold. Autumn was his favorite time of year, and he hated the thought of leaving these radiant, rolling hills for the flat, colorless prairies of North Dakota. Minnesota was a myriad of changing colors, at its best now in the full flush of fall. It even smelled better this time of year. It smelled of tucking in, of getting ready, like the squirrels were. They were all getting ready. Mary was getting their clothes ready, he and Jonathan were getting the wood ready…and I’m getting ready to leave Mary, Aaron thought.
She was coming out of the house with the clothes basket slung on her hip. Her hip didn’t jut out anymore. She was bigger already. He wondered if the child moved inside her yet and what it felt like when that happened. How he wished he could ask her. Sometimes, thinking of her, his unasked questions made his throat ache. The forced restraint made him seek out the hardest physical work. But wood-chopping was a cold substitute for shared intimacies.
Mary was wearing an oversized red plaid jacket, and he watched her hang clothes while he chopped. He thought of how it would feel to slip his arms inside the jacket and hug her, feel the baby between them. She hung the last wet shirt and blew on her hands to warm them. He kept up the wood-chopping, wishing he could go to her, open his shirt, and warm her fingers against his chest. She dropped the basket beside the path and headed for the outhouse. As she walked along, the plaid jacket blended with the scarlet sumac and she became a part of the fall foliage. Sometimes at night he’d hear her get up and go out there, and he wished he could get up and just walk with her, wait for her, and walk her back in, ask her if the baby made her uncomfortable. He didn’t think she’d been sick, but he knew there were lo
ts of discomforts involved with pregnancy. He wished he could share them with her, if only by talking about them.
When she came back down the path, he shouted in her direction, “Don’t lift that wash water, Mary!”
“No, I won’t, Aaron.” He could see her breath as she called across the October morning.
The depressive moods of her first pregnant months had gone away weeks ago, but Mary was having difficulty keeping the lump from her throat this morning. The letter with the Enderland, North Dakota, postmark had arrived yesterday afternoon. The men had delayed leaving until today to give Mary a chance to get their things ready and also to allow them time to get a load of winter wood into the yard and chopped. They had cut the timber in the woods and spent the day since the potato harvest sectioning it with the crosscut saw. If it was to dry, it needed chopping, but it looked like winter would catch them before they finished the job. Whether or not the wood supply ran out would depend on how long they stayed in North Dakota. If Mary got low, she could ask a neighbor to chop a supply for her. Thank heaven for neighbors, he thought. He’d miss Mary, but he needn’t worry about her.
The morning warmed quickly, and the day promised to be a beauty. Jonathan headed the horses in with the last load of wood and stopped at the near pasture, where Vinnie would stay until the winter snows pushed him into the barn. The bull approached the fence and stopped full-face to Jonathan.
“Howdy, big boy.” The clean, cylindrical lines of the bull were already nearing maturity. His smooth black coat gleamed in the sun. His red eyes gleamed from his dished face. Looking at the beautiful creature who represented so much of Jonathan’s hope for the future, the man found good reason in leaving his farm to work on another man’s land.
“I’ll be bringing home money to buy you a missus. Now what do you think of that?”
The red eye blinked.
“No. You wouldn’t yet, but come next spring when your sap is up you’ll thank me.”
The eye didn’t blink this time.
“Sure hate to leave you, Vinnie. You’ll do fine, though. Plenty of pasture time left before winter.”
Again it was between the man and the bull as if they talked the same language. Vinnie made a snuffling, low noise. “I’ll miss you, too. But just think about growin’ up, and by the time I get back you’ll be a little heavier.” Then he added, “So will Mary.”
His thoughts of the future held the image of his son and Vinnie’s sons growing together on the land. It made his leaving easier. Turning his back on the bull, he hoped for no unseasonably early snow this year. No one would be here to put Vinnie in the barn while they were gone. Checking the azure sky of October, he felt the weather would favor him. Vinnie’ll do fine, he thought, making his way up the lane toward the yard with the last load of wood.
The house had a curious stillness to it, as still as the autumn air that scarcely stirred the wood-smoke away from the chimney. It was the kind of brilliant noon that would usually be invigorating, Indian summer having its last fling. But this flawlessly perfect day had the opposite effect as the three of them waited for the sound of wagon wheels on the road. The faint remains of the dinner’s aromas tinted the air with hominess, but nobody had eaten much. Nobody’d said much, either, just the necessary last-minute instructions, the necessary lonely things. Some ashes gave way as a log collapsed in the cook-stove. Aaron came clumping down the stairs with his gear under one arm, and Jonathan said, “They’re here.” A buckboard full of men pulled into the driveway, and the men hoisted up bundles, jackets, bedrolls, keeping their eyes from Mary. Any last-minute thing they thought of to say seemed pointless. Neither of them liked leaving Mary alone in the house. Mary led the way to the door and stepped out onto the porch with a too-bright smile.
Aaron came past her first and kissed her cheek, leaning past the gear that encumbered him, saying, “The time’ll go fast. You’ll see.” Jonathan came next, weighted down, too. He lightly kissed her quivering mouth, and they both said, “Take care,” together before he made for the wagon. Aaron was already climbing aboard. The other men were in high spirits, feeling the fraternity of this all-male adventure. Their voices accompanied the sound of rocks being spit from under the wagon wheels as they left the yard.
Then it was quiet. Mary stood on the porch with tears silvering her cheeks. She blinked hard, trying to clear her vision, but the faces of the disappearing men were blurred. Finally she raised her apron, wiping her eyes dry momentarily, and saw Jonathan and Aaron squinting into the sun as the wagon jostled them with its motion. She realized they couldn’t see her on the shadowed porch, so she came down the step into the sunny yard and waved as the wagon disappeared over the crest of the first hill. A long time later, it reappeared, climbing the second hill, finally disappearing for good.
Mary stood, tears washing over her cheeks. Her wet lips widened silently at the uncaring sky as she dropped to her knees in the middle of the silent yard, cradling her swollen body. And for the first time the child became someone, not just something. Inside her was a growing body, alive, someone to be with her through her aloneness. Kneeling in the yard with her arms around her middle, she rocked and cried until she had quieted, then spread her hands wide upon herself. “Are you awake in there? I need your company. I know I haven’t given you much of my good thoughts, have I? Maybe this time we spend alone—just the two of us—will help us get to know each other better. Sorry I cried. I guess I’m the last one who should feel sorry for myself.”
The grainlands of North Dakota sprawled flat, the farms so large they took weeks to reap. The small farms of Todd County, after giving up their golden grains, gave up their men to these sisterlands to the west. It was a common practice for these harvest-hardened hands to hire out as threshers on the larger Dakota farms. Seven men were in the group that day. None of them relished leaving their homes behind, but a good year might find them returning with nearly two hundred dollars after a month’s work. Since bunk and board were provided by employers, the only expense incurred was the price of the train trip, probably only as far as Fargo. From there the men caught rides to the outpost farms.
Jonathan had been returning to the same farm for several years. Aaron had, too, with the exception of the year he’d been to town. So they’d been expecting the letter from Enderland. Wallace Getchner’s farm was as good as any, better than some. They remembered years when they’d hired out at places where the grub was bad, flies and filth in kitchens as slovenly run as the farms were. Sleeping accommodations weren’t important—any mow with a decent spread of hay would do—but ample, good food was a must, for the days were long and the work hard. Getchner paid fair wages, and his wife knew how to lay a good spread of food. There’s a thing about a misplaced man and good cooking that can take him closer to home than anything else. It brought the men back to Getchner’s year after year.
They’d ridden by train and buckboard, reaching the Enderland farm in the early evening. Getchner had hired six hands for this year’s harvesting. Three were already there when the buckboard arrived with the remaining three. Getting settled took little time, not much more than tossing their bedrolls into the haymow. Their small packs of extra clothing and personal articles were kept there, too. Washing up was done at the well in the yard in tepid water warmed by the teakettle Mrs. Getchner sent out. Meals were taken in a crowded fashion around the family’s kitchen table.
They began shocking the grain the following morning. Here the farms were so vast they weren’t measured in acres but in sections, these sections stretching away endlessly across the flat prairie as far as the eye could see. Unlike the Minnesota harvests, which were threshed in the yards near barns and granaries, these crops were threshed where they grew, in the fields. The threshing rig ate its way across the sections, chewing up shocks as it went, filling wagon after wagon with grain. Tiring day followed tiring day. The only thing to buck up the spirit was the promise of profits and an occasional letter from home.
Jonathan had written t
o Mary, a short note stating that they had arrived safely, telling of the good weather conditions, the number of workers Getchner had hired this year, ending with, “Aaron sends his best,” and signed, “your loving husband, Jonathan.” He wrote the same two letters each year, one right after he arrived, one just before leaving for home. If Jonathan was inarticulate in speech, he was equally so when putting his thoughts on paper. Only his closings indicated they were personal letters. Mary had always treasured these closings, for they were the only written words of love she had ever received from Jonathan.
Mail was speedy, for trains ran with great regularity, two or more per day passing through Browerville from either direction. So Mary got Jonathan’s letter the day after he’d sent it. She’d been sitting on the porch step in the noon sun, cracking hazelnuts with a tack hammer. The nuts, in their spiny husks, had been spread to dry on the roof of the granary, safely out of reach of the ever-searching squirrels.