A Tendering in the Storm (Change and Cherish Historical)

No. All Jack ever gave me was the oyster shell painting, and he’d taken that back. Well, he’d fathered Ida, but I felt nothing was due him for that.

  The stage left Portland at eight o’clock on that early August morning, taking us through Oregon City. The stage road hugged black basaltic rocks to the east, followed the river at the west. Though the sky was cloudless, I heard a sound like thunder as we rounded a bend. Then I saw it. Mist rose up from nearly a quarter mile of horseshoe-shaped falls stretching across the Willamette River. Tons of water silvered its way over the ridge of rocks and plunged thirty feet to the depths below, rolling and surging, then cascading out toward the Columbia that separated us from Washington Territory. “It’s where the Indians fish for salmon, by golly,” Karl shouted above the noise. Docks stacked with wheat ready for shipment jutted out well below the falls. “It will drive industry too,” Karl continued. “That chief factor of Hudson’s Bay chose this site long ago. He knew. We’re but a few miles now from Aurora Mills. It’s a good place to settle, Emma.” He smiled, and I thought he might take my hand in his and pat it. Instead he lifted Kate’s little chin and directed her eyes. “A rainbow,” Karl said. “Ja?” She nodded at the arc of color and light spinning over the waterfall. I saw her smile. She hadn’t done much of that.

  Maybe this was what I was supposed to do. Maybe when our minds and bodies are frayed, we have to do things that others think best, even when those things seem so contrary. In order to mend we allow others to light our paths back to safety, back to our place of belonging, into the folds of faith.

  There were prairies here, more wide-open spaces, not unlike Missouri. The stage stopped and we waited for the tollman to come out and lift the gate. The driver shouted to get the man’s attention but he didn’t leave the tollhouse. We decided to walk across, as we were the only passengers and none waited on the other side. We carried little luggage, and I managed that while using my cane. For a moment I hesitated again, wondering if the tollman might be held hostage inside by Jack or if Jack would jump out at us partway up the hill. Would it always be thus, fears of the possibilities overtaking joyous potential? Only if I allowed it, I decided. I would force myself to think of the good that could be until such thinking was habit. It was what I controlled now, my thoughts.

  The stage rolled through the open gate, and I balanced myself with my cane. Kate squatted to make mud pies along the riverbanks. It was a pleasant enough landscape with fir and white ash and cedar dotting the prairie. The air smelled fresh and sometimes when the wind lay, I thought I heard a band’s music. We looked like a typical family of the time, especially during war, when the man of the family soldiered off somewhere and a grandfather became the support that a woman with children needed.

  “What this place needs is an alert tollman, by golly,” Karl said, as annoyed as I’d ever seen him be. A man came out of the small wood hut that housed him, stretched. He must have fallen asleep in the warmth. “Sorry,” he said, putting his pail out for us to drop in our tolls.

  “You missed six dollars to collect if you’d been awake for the stage,” Karl told him.

  “Not mine to earn or keep,” he said, smiling. “He’ll pay on his return.”

  The grassy trail followed a natural incline, taking us into the town I’d so dreaded. I knew it in my imagination. My son had been here, the only family member to see this place. Well, Jack had been here. I just hoped he wasn’t here now.

  “Are we there, Mama?” Kate asked. She slapped dirt from her hands.

  “Almost,” I said. I stopped to catch my breath and touched her head. The sun warmed her dark curls. I shifted Ida on my shoulder, the weight of her a comfort.

  “Look for the biggest house,” Karl said. “That’s Elim, or at least what Wilhelm is living in until they build him his big house one day.”

  Louisa had made it sound so glorious, but Aurora Mills wasn’t much more than a few houses. Perhaps what gave someone the joy of home wasn’t in the actual features of a place, the structures or even gardens, but in the people. Maybe that was why I’d convinced Christian to stay in the Willapa country with his family, our family. Then he died and all the relationships changed. Who I was as Christian Giesy’s wife became the burden of Christian Giesy’s widow. Worse, I didn’t know who I was without him. Here, Louisa was surrounded by people who loved her and whom she loved back. No wonder she sang the town’s praises.

  We passed a single log house, then another with cut boards. Flowers grew at a window box. I wondered if the Wagonblast family that had walked their way across the continent with Keil and spent the winter with us had come here or had found lives outside the colony. Perhaps they’ll take me in. I stopped, the compass needle spinning around toward new options.

  “What is it, Emma?”

  I started forward again. “I will trust and not be afraid,” I said under my breath. “The Lord, the Lord is my song.”

  “From Isaiah,” Karl Ruge said. “Think of this too, Emma Giesy: ‘If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another.’ Like the disciples, we hold all in common. But we all have something to give; we share even what we fear as we walk in that light.” I nodded. “Ja, by golly, that’s what you must cling to now, sharing what you have and what you fear.”

  Beyond, hops fields would soon be ready for harvest. Small apple saplings grew amid stumps of trees. “I suppose Wilhelm still requires a tree be cut before breakfast,” Karl said. “He’s planted hickory trees, did I tell you this? Brought all the way from Bethel.” He pointed then. “That’s it.” We walked up a grassy grade to a two-story house with a wide porch on both levels. My heart started to pound; I held back. Karl spoke: “This is the way. Walk thee in it.”

  “Knock and it shall be opened,” I said, the old scriptures coming back to me like homing pigeons sent by someone I loved.

  Before Karl could knock on the door it opened from the inside and there stood Louisa Keil, a smile on her face.

  “I told Helena it was you!” she cried. “I said, ‘Emma Giesy and Karl Ruge are walking up our path,’ and she laughed. See who will laugh now! It’s them!” she shouted back over her shoulder. “Come see, Husband. And little Kate too.” She tried to squat, but her hip must have hurt. Still, Kate appeared to remember her from when they’d visited last year, because she didn’t seem shy with Louisa.

  “Can I have a cookie?” she asked. “I’m fairly hungry.”

  “Ja, sure. And who is this?” Louisa asked, as she steadied herself. She leaned over Ida’s face.

  “Ida,” I said. “Jack’s child.”

  “So fragile-looking, yet made such a long trip. You just come inside.” She spoke the j so it sounded like yust. “My goodness, you must be weary. Are Jack and the boys behind?” She looked past me toward the trail.

  “Jack isn’t coming. I hope,” I said.

  “Ah,” she said. Her words carried no judgment.

  “You’ve left your husband?” Helena Giesy asked. “ ‘The Lord God of Israel hateth putting away.’ ” She quoted the Old Testament’s Malachi.

  “Ja, divorce He abhors, but more, He hates violence. It is in the same verse, Helena.” I thought I caught Louisa smile as I turned to her. “The boys will come later, when Martin brings them.”

  “Then you are welcome to stay for as long as you like,” she said, inviting us into the cool of the wide entry where a staircase rose to the second floor. She reached for Ida. “Helena, prepare food for our guests. God has led you here,” she said to me. “That is all we need to know about the circumstances.” She scowled at Helena, who hadn’t moved yet. I hadn’t noticed before Louisa’s flying white eyebrows.

  32

  Emma

  Prayers of Preparation

  Within minutes of our untying our caps, Keil entered, filling the room. “Karl,” he said, giving him a bear hug, slapping his back. “Always good to see you in Aurora. Look, girls,” he motioned for his children, and four of them like stair steps stood beside him. “See w
ho is here now. My old friend, Karl. Your teacher,” he said. The children nodded politely, and then he dismissed them to one of the big rooms on either side of the entry. To Aurora he said, “Take Sister Emma’s children with you when you go.”

  I hadn’t been here five minutes and Keil, who had not even acknowledged my presence, already directed my children. “Kate can go, but Ida I’ll keep with me.”

  “Ja, she’s so young. Barely a month old she looks like,” Louisa said.

  Keil didn’t seem to notice that she stood with me in defying him. “Get Kate some milk. And cookies,” Louisa said, and Kate happily went with young Aurora, never looking back.

  “So. You come to stay this time,” Keil said. He spoke to Karl and it wasn’t a question. “I cannot get those from Bethel to hurry along.” I waited for Karl to reply as Keil motioned him into the side room. “You,” Keil continued, turning to me, motioning me to follow. “Emma Giesy. Why are you here without the rest of your family?”

  “I’ve come for … protection,” I said. “From my husband. I’m no longer a widow, but I seek a widow’s solace.”

  Those piercing dark eyes stared, ready to intimidate at a moment’s notice. “I would not have let you marry Jack Giesy if you had sought permission, which you should have.”

  “I was never good at permission-seeking,” I said.

  “Ja. This I remember,” he said. He raised his finger to the air. He grunted then crossed his arms over his broad chest. “Now you come seeking a widow’s solace.”

  “As the colony protected women back in Bethel whether they were members or not. Whether they’d made wise choices placing them in need or not. Isn’t that so? It was the Diamond Rule we tendered there, to make others’ lives better than our own.”

  “Divorce we do not approve of.”

  “She quotes Malachi to us,” Helena said. The tall woman had stepped into the room uninvited. I was pleased to see that Louisa had as well.

  “Violence covering like a garment, the Lord does not approve of that either,” I said. “Does God ask us simply to endure? Is this the Diamond Rule of the discipleship?”

  I teetered at the top of a pyramid and could imagine Keil pushing me either way: to this colony and safety or back to the bed I’d made. I felt my face flush to be in such a precarious place, throwing myself at the mercy of the man I so despised. I decided then that if Keil would not receive us, I would get the boys and we would go to San Francisco, someplace far away, and we would make a path, God willing. But I’d never go back to Jack. I didn’t belong with him.

  “I won’t need your protection for long,” I offered. “I have a plan.”

  “Ja, you always did have that,” Keil said.

  “Women and children in need have always been safe with the colony,” Karl said. “It is the Lord’s most important directive to us. Is that not right, Wilhelm? Is that different here in Aurora Mills than it was back in Bethel?”

  Keil placed his fingertips together in front of him, Karl’s words causing him to pause.

  “We offer protection for any who need it. Women, children, slaves. Does she need it?” He asked Karl.

  He’d accept Karl’s assessment but not mine. “I’ve seen enough of Jack’s ways to be worried, by golly. Emma has no reason to come here otherwise. She gives up what she and Christian worked together for. She prays that Martin will bring her sons soon and that you will allow her to stay. Perhaps she can go somewhere else after that.”

  “Martin thinks about coming? To stay?” Louisa interjected.

  “He would be a big help here,” Helena said.

  “As I’ve often said,” Louisa added. “With your doctoring, my husband. You would have relief.”

  “Louisa, you mustn’t—”

  “It’s true, Husband. Maybe more will come from Willapa now that Karl and Emma have. If we treat Emma as we should.”

  Keil sighed. “Oh, the weight of leadership.” He looked at me. “Both of you speak truths. I know Jack. Something … happens to him at times.” Keil looked away. “We saw it here. I thought it was the whiskey and prayed he would give it up.”

  “I speak another truth,” I said.

  “What is that, Sister Emma?” Keil said.

  I swallowed hard, and my fingertips, crooked now from Jack’s maltreatment, made tiny circles against the pads of my thumb. I had to be willing to accept the colony’s help but also to assert my claim. “I ask for asylum then not as any widow but as the widow of the leader of the colony’s scouts, as the wife of a man who did God’s bidding and yours with a faithful heart. It is my due.”

  “You are a bold one, Sister Emma,” Helena said. “After all that has happened.”

  “She only asks what a mother needs,” Louisa said. “Even our Lord tells us to seek that.”

  “Christian would want you to do this, Wilhelm,” Karl said. “Without asking, she deserves it. She is here asking. That is enough.”

  Keil clapped his hands. “You’re right, Karl. You will stay here with us, in this gross Haus where we live and the bachelors live and where you can help Louisa and the girls with the cooking. You will give and receive in return. And our presence will offer the greatest protection for when Jack comes here. And I know he will.”

  “It will be like before when we all stayed together,” Louisa said. Her voice was light, and she sounded like she planned an approved wedding. “Just like when we lived in the stockade together, only without the harsh winter this time.”

  “And without the husband who loved me,” I said.

  Louisa leaned in to me and patted my arm. “It has been four years, Sister Emma. Time to turn old griefs into tender stories.”

  In the days that followed, Keil couldn’t have been more congenial to me. Maybe because I’d brought Karl with me. Maybe because we all awaited Martin’s arrival with my boys, and Keil hoped he would convince Martin to remain, too. Maybe because I worked hard. Perhaps Louisa said good words about me and maybe Helena said nothing. I never complained, not once. Whatever the reason, he treated me as though I was a singular person, and I began to think I did deserve a life without threats, a safe dwelling place. Being here would never replace what Christian and I had built together in Willapa, but it would remind me always that God did provide and with that would come peace.

  Helena led prayers in the morning before we began the day’s cooking in the bottom floor of the house. I hadn’t realized there were four stories when I’d arrived. It was a pleasant act, I found, starting the day with praise for life, thanking the hunters who provided the meat and those who tended the flour mill, hoping that harvest would go well. She asked that the food be prepared with love and then we’d begin, joined by other colony women, Louisa included.

  Had the women done this back in Bethel? I couldn’t remember. I’d lived in my family’s home then, just a daughter helping my mother. We hadn’t shared kitchens as we did here. We spoke a table grace but hadn’t offered prayers for preparation. Prayers for preparation. That’s how I began each morning now. I prayed that the boys would arrive soon, asked that Jack might never come. In the evening as we prepared to bed down, Keil spoke words to give us restful sleep. The bachelors and Keil’s children all slept on the top floor, to which they’d go after the evening prayers. Keil and his wife slept on the first floor. Kate and I rolled out mats at the far side of the first floor in the kitchen area. I could see the moon rise through the window. I’d be able to hear anyone arriving on the porch. It was a short walk to the privy. How simple my needs were now. I’d be full every day if my sons were just here, if I was sure they were safe and that Andy had not returned to our home to get into Jack’s way.

  The time spent with the Keils gave me a new picture of Louisa. She did what she wanted, though mostly what she wanted was what Keil would approve of. Still, she influenced her husband and she lightened the tone for the workers, made little jokes. I’d always seen her as serious, somber even. Perhaps Helena’s presence had rescued Louisa from having to be so stern.
She liked words and their sounds and joked that my Strudel was as “fine as a frog’s hair.” When Keil’s voice took on a frustrated tone, it was Louisa who calmed him and suggested who could assist, since he must be tired, so very tired, with all the burdens he carried. Once I thought she patronized with those words, but she meant them. She saw how he labored to make the colony operate and wanted to support him. It was how I’d served Christian once; I wished my wants were as generous and simple now.

  One day Louisa surprised me by suggesting that I make a few drawings.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “There’s a harvest fair in October. Wilhelm says it will be the first-ever Oregon State Fair, and we can enter things that are judged. Paintings and needlework and dried fruits and baskets, even essays, words. And flowers.”

  “Women enter these things?”

  “Last year there were several women who earned recognition. You draw lovely pictures. I’ve seen you do them for Kate. So then, go to the store and ask for drawing material.”

  “I doubt they’ll have such a thing as pencils and whatnot.”

  “They’ll get what you need. It’s the common fund. Don’t you remember?”

  I remembered. “I’d always resented that practice,” I told her. She raised an eyebrow. “It made me feel weak almost, that if I took something, then I’d always owe someone else. Or if I had nothing to give, then I was taking advantage of another. That’s how I felt in Willapa after Christian died. It’s why I tried so hard to do it on my own. Marrying Jack seemed like a good way to not be dependent on the Giesys.”

  “Ach, Emma,” she said. She patted my floured hand as I kneaded the dough. I added a little loaf sugar to sweeten it, something we didn’t have in Willapa. I sat to do much of this work, still weak. “We put things into the common basket so it can be taken out. It’s what love is. We all have things to give. The work we do that tends to others, that goes into the basket. What we grow for sale. Even our listening hearts, those are all a part of the fellowship of the common fund. It’s not only money, Emma. There is always enough for everyone and all contribute. We put things in; we draw things out. Only God is enough.”