Old Nelson would soon have a full dozen grandchildren if he counted those on the way. And they were begotten and sprung from the four different races. When the parents came to see him he would always lift up the grandchildren and put them on his knee; he wanted to make sure they were healthy and weighed as much as they should. The children were unlike and spoke differently, but this was not to wonder at: a Swedish father, an Irish mother, a Norwegian father, a German mother. What a mixed group of children they were! No one could guess they belonged to the same family. But they did have something in common: the same grandfather. He was the father’s father or the mother’s father for all of them. Through Charles O. Nelson, the old one in the old house, these human plants were linked together.
When he emigrated his father had reproached him: You drag my family out of the country. Today he understood better than at that time what his father had meant: You take with you also coming generations and decide their fate; you decide for both the living and the unborn. If Nils Jakob’s Son now could have seen the great flock of his great-grandchildren at the Nelson Settlement he might have said: Karl Oskar, you have not only dragged my family out of the country, you have also mixed up my descendants with foreign races. In these brats not much is left of my race.
And the Lord only knew what might come of all this mixture of people with different roots from different lands. Would they form a race of their own? But there was no use speculating about this, he himself would soon be gone. At the most for only a few years he would see his grandchildren play around the house. Already a third generation was shooting up from his root, and soon the world would spin its turn without the originator of this family, without the old one in the old house. Nothing would change when he disappeared. People returned to dust every moment and nothing would change when his turn came.
Charles O. Nelson listened, annoyed and pleased, to the hubbub his grandchildren raised down in the yard. Undoubtedly they were up to something, perhaps ruining the new saplings his boys had planted last spring. He was proud of these new plum and cherry trees, he felt responsible for them in some way. They were tender yet could easily be broken; those kids should get a good spanking if they hurt them.
He could hear his son’s woman yell at the children; Stephen Bolle’s girl had a strong, piercing voice, but he couldn’t understand a word she said, she must be talking Irish. She and Johan shouldn’t be so soft with the children.
His own children hadn’t entirely forgotten their mother tongue. If they wanted to they could speak it. He reproached himself that he could no longer speak his native language well; when some newcomer arrived from Småland he realized how much he had forgotten. How could a man’s tongue change so much that he no longer could use words clearly which he had spoken thousands of times?
He looked up at the old creaking clock on the other wall. Only a quarter past two. Still many hours till evening and blessed sleep. But tonight it would be hard to sleep, the ache was coming alive. For a day or two his back would be all right, and then it would start again. The ache sat like an auger in his back, it had its home there, its designated place which it never left. The auger’s sharp, steel edge turned steadily, inexorably. It was drilling a hole in his back, but one that it never finished.
Cartilage had grown between the vertebrae, said the doctors in St. Paul and Stillwater. He had once received a blow across his back from the oak he was felling, and in that place the gristle lumps had grown. None of the doctors’ many salves, plasters, and liniments had been able to drive out the pain. He had tried all the remedies known, even those of the old country — lying on cat skins and dog skins, rubbing himself with sheep fat and pork bile, or concoctions of flowers and herbs, moss and ferns. Anything neighbors and friends suggested he would try, but nothing really helped. The auger remained in his back and kept on turning, and would keep on turning as long as he lived.
His backache was the final reward for his labor, for the farmer’s toil. He drew his pay daily in his old age, the sure reward for the oldster.
Charles O. Nelson moved a little in his bed, made his back more comfortable, turned and twisted a little to escape the auger. It hurt most in the afternoons, by evening it eased a little, and then he would walk about over the farm. This was an old habit, to inspect the Nelson Settlement before he retired for the night. At day’s end the old farmer walked to the houses that had been his, saw to it that every door was closed, everything put inside that might suffer from a change in the weather, that the animals were well, that all things — living and dead — were in good keeping. This was a farmer’s daily chore, and he had performed it through the years. Now, as he walked about and saw that all was well, he felt he was still the master of the Nelson Settlement.
The evening inspection would take quite a while for old Charles O. Nelson. His limp made him move slowly, he had to lean on his stick each time he moved his left foot. He took one long step with the healthy leg and two short with the injured one. He walked with bent back, he limped; shuffling along he found his way. It was a great effort for him and when he returned to his room he was completely exhausted. But it was his best hour of the day.
Today he was waiting for that hour, and he had an occupation that helped speed the time. He sat up in bed and pulled out a drawer in the table beside him. He picked up a large folded paper and began to unfold it, slowly, methodically, as if in so doing he would cheat the pain.
It was a map of Ljuder parish. It was his home district that was spread before him here on the blanket. Charles O. Nelson always had the map handy, was always eager to look at the thick, heavy paper with a miniature of his home village. Many years ago he had acquired this map from his son-in-law, Mr. C. A. Persson, “in exchange for his daughter” as he called it. He had lost his oldest daughter but he had received instead a map of his home village.
The map of Ljuder during the years had become worn from frequent handling by the old emigrant. It was made of good paper, but he had fingered it so often and turned and opened it, that it was wrinkled and barely held together at the creases. That was why he handled it so carefully.
Here before him he had his whole home parish with well-marked borders, from Lake Laen in the north to Lake Loften in the south. Across this paper his index finger found the markings, followed the roads he once had walked, stopped at places he knew well, familiar names of farms and cottages. Here was the crossroads where he had danced in his youth, the grove where they had celebrated sunrise picnics, wastelands where he had hunted, lakes, rivers, and brooks where he had fished. He followed lines and curves, he stopped at squares and triangles. There was so much to look for, so much to find. And at each place where his finger stopped his memories awakened: This was his childhood and youth.
How many times hadn’t his fingers wandered over this map. But he was never through with it. Each day he started his search anew. When he had found everything he was looking for, he began all over again. He had been thumbing and reading the map of Ljuder day in, day out, at night with the help of his oil lamp, when the ache assailed him, when sleep fled his bed, weekdays and holidays, summer and winter, year after year, until the thick paper was worn thin from all the thumbing and was ready to fall apart.