The travelers from Ljuder were in a foreign forest, yet they had arrived home: No longer were they the lost ones of this world.
— 2—
At first the group of immigrants walked with good speed along the path on the ridge, but as the day wore on their burdens grew heavier and their steps slowed. All grownups had something to carry: of the children, only Danjel’s two sons were able to walk the whole distance; he had to carry his four-year-old daughter Fina. Karl Oskar held Lill-Märta on one arm, extra clothing over his shoulder, and the knapsack in one hand. Kristina carried Harald, and this was considered sufficient, as she also carried another child within her. The food basket was entrusted to Robert. Johan could walk short distances, but his little legs soon tired and he too wanted to be carried. Karl Oskar stooped down and let the boy climb onto his back with his arms around the father’s neck. Karl Oskar was no longer a fast walker.
Jonas Petter walked ahead of the others to locate the trail, which sometimes seemed to disappear in dense thickets filled with mosquitoes. It was his duty to see that they never lost sight of the river. As they progressed the thickets became more prevalent, and those with heavy burdens had to walk with care through the thorny bushes.
They had feared Fina-Kajsa would delay their progress but the old woman had a surprisingly tough body, and in spite of her emaciated condition, she kept well ahead of the younger walkers. She trotted along quite briskly, holding onto her iron pot, which she dared not leave behind with the minister in Stillwater, fearing it might be lost, as the grindstone was in New York. She had walked many miles during her lifetime, going to church at home on Öland every Sunday for fifty years, a distance of fifteen miles back and forth. Altogether, this would make enough miles to cover the distance from Sweden to Minnesota many times; indeed, she would easily manage the short distance left to reach her son’s home, if it were true that they were now so close to him. And she described again the fine house he had built himself in the wilderness. He had written many letters to his parents about it — there was no place on Öland that compared with his home, his extensive fields, and possessions. He had asked his parents to come and see it, then they would be well pleased with their son. And Fina-Kajsa was convinced her son had changed into an industrious, capable man here in America, or he wouldn’t have been able to acquire such a home. It had been well for him to get out in the world.
A west wind was blowing, cooling their perspiring brows; the air no longer felt oppressive.
By midafternoon they sat down to rest under a great oak that stood all by itself in an open, pleasing meadow. Now their communal food basket was brought out; during the last weeks of their journey they had become one big household; it seemed unnecessary to divide themselves into two families at meals, leaving Jonas Petter to sit alone. It was easier to keep all the food together; what one missed someone else had, one had bread but no meat, someone else meat but no bread.
After the meal, the immigrants stretched out on the ground under the giant oak; it was comfortable in the shade, and they all felt well and rested contentedly. But the children played in the tall grass of the meadow; they had already eaten their fill of raspberries, blueberries, currants, and wild plums. Many unfamiliar berries also grew hereabouts but parents forbade the children to taste these, fearing they might be poisonous. On little trees almost like bushes grew clusters of berries resembling over-large blueberries, and Robert insisted these were wild grapes. From them wine could be pressed, the drink of noble people at home, which ordinary people got a taste of once a month at communion. They tasted the grapes cautiously, they seemed sweet and good, but they dared not eat more than a handful lest they get drunk from these sweet berries that made wine: it was written in the Bible that one could get drunk from sweet wine.
Elin filled her little basket with great, juicy dark-red raspberries, which she showed proudly to her mother. The girl’s fingers were stained blood red from the overripe berries.
“Here in America we can have beautiful rosy cheeks,” Ulrika said. “We can wash our faces in raspberry juice.”
Kristina’s eyes never left her children. They mustn’t go too far away, no one knew where snakes might lie hidden in the thick grass which was indeed a good hiding place for all kinds of dangerous creeping things. Jonas Petter had already killed two green-striped snakes, but they were no larger than the snakes at home. Danger was by now such a persistent companion that Kristina considered it omnipresent: its shape might alter but it was always at hand in some guise. She had once and for all accepted danger, and consequently she met it with less worry than before.
Here in the forest only the venomous mosquitoes annoyed her and all of them; they swarmed about constantly and bit every exposed part of the body. The delicate skin of the children was attacked most fiercely, and their faces showed welts from the bites. They had never encountered such disgusting gnats before. Everything was different in America, day and night, weather and animals: the warmth was warmer, the darkness darker, the rain wetter than at home — and the mosquitoes were a thousand times worse.
Kristina’s eyes had come to rest on the men sprawling in the grass, and suddenly she burst out laughing: “Ulrika — look at those shaggy-bearded, long-haired men! Don’t they look worse than scarecrows?”
Unmarried Ulrika of Västergöhl joined in the laughter. None of the men had had scissors or razors near their heads since leaving Sweden, and now their hair hung down on their shoulders. Danjel had always worn a beard, but Karl Oskar and Jonas Petter, accustomed to shave at home, had left their beards unattended — it had been difficult to use razors on the journey. Arvid had a thin growth of beard and seldom needed a shave, and Robert had not yet begun to shave, but their hair had grown long. Gathered together in a group, all the men seemed equally shaggy and rough. On the journey, Kristina had not paid much attention to their appearance, but alone here in the forest she was suddenly conscious of their uncombed hair and beards: they seemed like a group of wild highway robbers. And she said, if this had been the first time she had laid eyes on Karl Oskar, meeting him like this in the forest, she would have been scared to death of the man and would have run away to hide as fast as her legs would carry her.
“Hmm,” said Jonas Petter. “The worst part is, my beard itches like a louse nest.”
“Our poor men are pale and skinny,” Ulrika said. “That’s what makes them look so frightful.”
Yes, Jonas Petter thought he had lost about fifty pounds from heat and diarrhea, his trousers hung loose around his waist as though fastened to a fence post. Their bodies were only skeletons covered by sun-parched skin. But all American men were thin; they were Americans now — and by and by they would also be rich.
Ulrika admitted that the men in America were skinny. But she insisted they were courteous and well behaved and kind and considerate toward women. She had never before seen a man like that priest they lodged with last night — he had even grabbed the pail out of her hand when she wanted to fetch water and had gone to the well himself. A minister in America fetching water for Ulrika of Västergöhl — what would people in Ljuder say if they had seen that!
Ulrika kept an eye on her daughter, who was now busy picking flowers.
Elin called to Robert: “Come and see! Such beautiful cowslips!”
Robert hurried to her side; he looked on the ground between the lush bushes but could see neither cowslips nor any other flowers. “Where are they?”
“They flew away!” the girl exclaimed in surprise.