“We mustn’t lose our heads,” insisted Karl Oskar. “We can’t be sure.”
“Do you still doubt him?”
“The bills might be worthless.”
“Do you think your brother is a counterfeiter?”
No, he didn’t mean his brother had printed the bills himself. But there was so much confusion about money in America. Some states were flooded with bills entirely without value, printed by banks that had opened only to swindle people. Robert’s bills were well printed and consequently suspicious. They must be cautious.
Kristina felt a hundred-dollar bill. “They’re creased and crumpled — they look like good ones.”
When she found time she would iron out the big bills and remove the grease spots and dirt. Such big bills ought to be clean and smooth. Then she was sure they would pass for their full value.
“I had better go to the bank in Stillwater and ask them,” said Karl Oskar. “But I can’t get away before Saturday. Then we’ll know what Robert’s money is worth.”
Today was Monday; he had promised to go with Algot Svensson to the land office in Stillwater on Saturday to witness his neighbor’s right to his claim. He would take the bills with him to the bank and ask their value and if the bank was willing to accept them. Before the end of the week he would know. And before that time they must not mention to a single soul the four thousand dollars which had found its way into his home so unexpectedly.
Kristina said that this was riches. First of all they must now find a good place for safekeeping. Everything else they would think about by and by. . Forty bills, each one worth a hundred dollars! If they had had a single one of these bills when they had arrived five years ago then it would have saved them many troubles and privations. And if they had had this sum in Sweden they would never have needed to emigrate. . It was strange to think of that.
“Dare we keep the money in the house?”
Karl Oskar thought there would be no danger; no one would search for riches here. Robbers and thieves knew that whatever else they might find in a settler’s house, it would not be cash.
With loving hands Kristina gathered the bills together into one big bundle, wrapped them in her silken kerchief, and put them down in the bottom of her Swedish chest. It was the safest place she could think of. And yet it would be difficult for her to sleep tonight — what a worry to have fifteen thousand riksdaler in cash in the house! They must be careful with the fire tonight.
Karl Oskar went out to the stable to look after a sick calf; he should have done it earlier but this evening he had forgotten both people and animals. He gave the calf some milk in a bucket and looked to see that his livestock was all right; one never knew: some animal might get tangled up in its chain and choke itself to death. Never would he go to bed of an evening without first checking that all was well with the animals in his stable.
When he returned Kristina had already gone to bed. In this new house they each had a bed on opposite walls of the big room. He started to undress although it would be a long time before he could go to sleep tonight. His head buzzed with questions: What about this money? Was it real or not? And how had Robert got his hands on it? He couldn’t have earned that much through work; had he actually found gold? Kristina had said that a little child could have such luck. . Well, that could be true. And in California one might dig gold in the earth as easily as potatoes here in Minnesota. If one had luck. Luck! While he had slaved here on his claim every working day for four years and not been able to save a cent of cash, Robert had dug up a few lumps of gold which in one turn had made him rich — so rich that he never need do another days work in his whole life. At least that was what he said. Could it be the truth? It didn’t seem right, if it had happened that way. He had never believed in success except through honest work; luck and good fortune could aid for a while, but the only permanent reward came from honest work. If Robert had told the truth, then he — Karl Oskar — had been wrong in his thinking.
He always tried to keep a clear head. And he must do the same this time. He must not be fooled. In America one heard so many tales of swindles. During the last year so many good-for-nothings had arrived in the Territory; they didn’t want to break the land, only speculate in it. They wanted to be rich without working, just like Robert. They were parasites, vermin, trying to live off the settlers, like bloodsucking lice lived on the human body. It always irritated him to hear of these lazy speculators who had descended on them and who wouldn’t leave. As yet there was no real order in the Territory; the land was too vast, the farmers too few, and the speculators and the swindlers too many.
He said goodnight to his wife, who still lay awake in her bed. He had barely put his head against the pillow before a thought came to him which made him quickly sit up again. The paper! Hemlandet! He could find out right now!
Why hadn’t he thought of that at once? Every week the Swedish paper had a column — Bank Swindles — which enumerated the banks that printed and issued valueless or below-par money. Recently he had counted twelve banks in the column. Wasn’t one of them an Indiana bank? Wasn’t the Indiana State Bank of Bloomfield listed in the paper?
He could find out this very moment about Robert’s riches in hundred-dollar bills. He had saved every copy of Hemlandet. He had put them away on a shelf in the cupboard within arm’s reach of his bed.
He almost called out to Kristina: We needn’t wait till I go to Stillwater on Saturday! We can find out right away if we have become rich tonight! Or — if we are as poor as before.
But from his wife’s even breathing he could hear she had already gone to sleep. He mustn’t disturb her. If she were to learn the truth, the truth as he suspected it to be, she would take the disappointment so hard that she wouldn’t go to sleep again. Let her rest, let her be rich for one night. Tomorrow would be soon enough for her to learn, if it were so. But he himself must know the truth this evening.
Cautiously, silently, Karl Oskar rose from his bed. He lit a candle and stood in his nightshirt before the cupboard. From the shelf he took the accumulated copies of Hemlandet, every one of them, put them on the table, pulled up a chair, and began to read.
The latest paper had come on Friday. He found the headline: Bank Swindles. In that column the Indiana State Bank was not listed. But in the adjoining column his eyes fell on a notice about counterfeit twenty dollar gold pieces that the public was warned about: they were easy to recognize, the world gold above the head of the figure representing Liberty was present on the false coin. But this did not concern him; it was not a question of stamped coins, it was bills. .
Danjel Andreasson had once last year been cheated with a five dollar coin that a hog buyer from St. Paul had fooled him with. This coin had even been stamped IN GOD WE TRUST and that was why he had accepted it. Afterwards Danjel had been greatly disturbed that counterfeiters announced on their coins that they had faith in God. He had never thought that in America — the Lord’s Promised Land — such dishonest people existed who would invoke God’s name in their own counterfeiting.
Karl Oskar picked up the next copy. He went through issue after issue of the paper and read all the lists of banks which cheated people with valueless bills. He found the names of only two banks in Indiana. But the one which had printed Robert’s bills — the Indiana State Bank of Bloomfield — he did not see. That bank was not listed.
With a deep sigh he blew out the candle: the bills must be real then. Robert had probably told the truth.
When he crept into his bed for the second time this evening and pulled the blanket over him, Kristina awoke.