Fina-Kajsa pointed out to the group what might have happened to them if she hadn’t been along to recognize Anders. And turning to her son she asked: “But what kind of sickness ails you? Your face blooms like a red rose!”
“It’s the heat, Mother.”
Anders Månsson greatly resembled his father, whom they all remembered from the beginning of their journey, and whom they had helped bury in the North Sea. Anders was a thickset man with broad, somewhat stooping shoulders. He was almost bald, his complexion was red, his nut-brown eyes restless, avoiding a direct look at them. At first he had looked threatening, but now they discovered he was shy to a fault.
Twilight was upon them, they had arrived none too soon. They walked down a slope, through a grove of green trees, and arrived at a level, low-lying piece of ground. They could see water, a lagoon or small tarn, bordered by tall grass. Near the water was tilled ground, they saw a yellowed stubble field with some rye shocks. These were Anders Månsson’s fields which he himself had cleared. By now it was too dark to see how far the fields extended. A cabin stood in the flat meadow, with a few lindens and elms around it. There were other cabins across the rye field.
Anders Månsson approached the small cabin of roughly hewn logs; it was situated like a hay barn in the meadow.
“So this is your hay shed,” said Fina-Kajsa.
“Hay shed?” the son repeated, as if not remembering what the Swedish word meant.
Anders opened the door, and Fina-Kajsa stuck in her head to inspect the hay crop in her son’s shed.
“Did you get much hay this summer?” she asked. She couldn’t see any hay at all, but in the dim light she espied pieces of furniture; clothing and tools hung on pegs around the walls: “You keep your hay shed empty!”
“Yes — no — You see, Mother, I have no hay in this house—”
“Do you have people living in the barn?”
“I live here myself.”
“Isn’t this your hay barn?”
“No, Mother. It is my house.”
“But why do you live in the barn? Where’s your main house?”
“I have built this cabin for my own use. Welcome to my home, Mother! We must boil these rabbits for supper.”
And Anders Månsson took out his hunting knife and began to skin and clean his game.
Fina-Kajsa turned to her Swedish traveling companions: “My son is the same! Here he stands lying to my face. He won’t show us his home. He’s telling stories. All of you can see this is nothing but a barn. A small barn.”
The rest of the immigrants had at first, like the old woman, taken this cabin for a hay barn, since it sat in the middle of a field. Also it was rather small, not more than fifteen or sixteen feet square. And the door, cut through the logs without a jamb, was as low as a barn door. Kristina whispered to Karl Oskar: This house was exactly like their meadow barn which had burned down when lightning struck it.
But by and by they all understood that Anders Månsson had led them to his main house; this barn was his home. All understood this, but none mentioned it — none except his mother.
“Anders! Don’t fool me any longer! Show me your house!” she commanded.
“This is my house, Mother! Come into my house, all you Svenskar! I’ll fix you a good supper tonight.”
And the immigrants obeyed him and entered his humble abode; fatigue had overcome them to the very marrow of their bones, and they climbed with great contentment over the log serving as threshold, happy and pleased to be in a house, under a roof, having reached a shelter where they could rest.
But old Fina-Kajsa sat down on her pot outside the cabin, she remained there, repeating more and more severely, “Take me to your house!”
While all the others gathered in the cabin, and darkness fell, she remained there, sitting on her iron pot. At length Anders went outside and half carried, half dragged his mother over the threshold.
The group from Ljuder had now reached the end of their long journey. All but the widow Fina-Kajsa Andersdotter from Öland. She had not yet arrived: she had not yet seen the home her son had described in his letters. It had come to pass as she had predicted so often during the journey: she would never arrive.
XIII. DISTANT FIELDS LOOK GREENEST
— 1—
The arrival of the Swedish immigrants in Taylors Falls was a momentous occurrence. The whole population of the village consisted of only thirty-odd people, and with the fifteen new arrivals it was increased in one day by half. Until now there had been only four women in the settlement; with the arrival of Fina-Kajsa, Kristina, Ulrika, and Elin their number had doubled. Previously there had been only three families, the rest were single men.
Taylors Falls had been named for an American, Jesse Taylor, who was the first white man to settle here, twelve years earlier; he had built a sawmill at the falls. He had since died, but the mill was operated by an old Irishman named Stephen Bolles who had also started a flour mill. A German couple, the Fischers, had recently opened a combined inn and store, consisting of two log cabins connected by a roofed passage. Mr. and Mrs. Fischer also kept a bull to serve the settlers’ cows. A general store was owned and operated by a Scot, Mr. Abbott, who was the postmaster as well, with the post office located in the store. The largest building in the settlement was occupied by the Stillwater Lumber Company.
Besides Fina-Kajsa’s son, two other Swedes lived in Taylors Falls, one man and one woman — Samuel Nöjd and Anna Johansdotter, the latter known as Svenska Anna, or Swedish Anna. Samuel Nöjd was a fur hunter by trade, and Swedish Anna was cook in a logging camp a few miles north of the village. With fifteen newcomers the Swedish population in this part of the St. Croix River Valley increased six-fold at once.
Anders Månsson offered the use of his cabin to his homeless countrymen until they could build living quarters for themselves or for as long as they wished to stay. Helping them thus he was only repaying a debt: “You have cared for my mother,” he said.
And should they feel too cramped in his cabin, they might sleep at German Fischer’s inn; lodging there would cost only ten cents a night for each person; they would, of course, have to sleep with other people, but never more than four in the same bed; and the host was quite strict and let no one wear his boots in bed. The Fischers were particular and cleanly people and maintained good order at their inn.
There were now sixteen persons living in Anders Månsson’s small cabin; but they had become accustomed to close quarters during their voyages; indeed, they had been more cramped in the holds. Here they could let their children run outside in the daytime and could themselves go out whenever they wished, so they need not jostle each other in the house all the time. Since Anders Månsson was kind enough to let them use his house, they accepted gratefully. In this way they saved a dollar and fifty cents a day, the amount it would have cost them if all had been forced to sleep at the inn. And Fina-Kajsa’s son felt proud that they considered his cabin good enough; he was well pleased with it himself. During his first winter in Taylors Falls he had lived with thirteen other people in a cabin half as large as this one. He said it was only nine feet square, and only six feet from the ground to the roof, and it had no flooring.
The travelers could now rest for a few days until their belongings arrived. The men helped Anders Månsson harvest his crop. His fields were smaller than they had realized; he had broken barely eight acres. He owned a team of oxen and two cows as well. But he would only keep one cow for the winter; he intended to butcher the other one, for she was too old to breed. Each time he milked his cows all four women came to watch him: they had never before seen a man do the milking.