“If this is the truth then they live like wild beasts in California.”
“No one cares about his life. But all care about gold!”
“They’re out of their minds if they value gold higher than their lives.”
Robert leaned toward her and spoke in a lowered voice, as if confiding a great secret to her:
“The gold diggers are people who want to die.”
“Ah, nonsense! They must want to live and get rich and enjoy their riches.”
“But why should they give their lives for nuggets if they didn’t want to die? They would rather lie in their graves than give up the gold.”
“You talk so strangely, Robert.”
She forgot her sewing and looked into his drawn, wan face. The skin was taut across his forehead and cheeks and it looked as if the bones beneath were trying to push through.
“But you yourself? Did you go to California because you didn’t wish to live any longer? To kill yourself?”
“I meant the others. It was different with me. My real errand was not to dig gold. .”
And he looked beyond her, out through the window, at the tall maples outside, as he added, emphatically, “I did care for life. But I didn’t know this until afterward.”
“Afterward. .?”
His speech was full of riddles. But now he gave no further explanation; he rose and went to the kitchen, where he picked up the scoop to drink. The bucket was empty; he hung it on his arm and went toward the spring. He moved with tardy, clumsy steps; he no longer had a young person’s quick and easy walk.
When he returned with the bucket filled, Kristlna could hear him panting from exhaustion.
“You needn’t carry in water if you don’t feel up to it. The bucket is heavy enough for a healthy person.”
“I’ll manage.”
She said that it was good luck they had found such a fine and large spring which gave healthy and clear water in abundance, and tasted so good. The spring was invaluable to them, even though they had to walk a good bit to it.
Robert drank and hung the scoop on its nail above the bucket. Then he came back into the room where Kristina sat with her sewing, and watched her as she forced the shears through the cloth, following the white chalk marks she had made.
He said, “You know, I don’t hear well with one of my ears, Kristina. I didn’t hear what you just said — what was it?”
She repeated what she had said about the clear water from their spring.
After that he sat silent for a long while.
— 2—
The intense heat of summer had started in earnest that week. In Minnesota’s oppressive air the chores were performed languidly; physical motion was an effort. Kristina was using her shears and her needle — the lightest tools a person could use — but she often dried her perspiring forehead with the corner of her apron. Yet it was cellar-cool here inside compared to the sweltering heat out in the sun.
The lake water was already tepid, and Johan, Marta, and Harald — the three children she called “big”—had, after persistent begging, obtained their mother’s permission to go bathing in the shallow inlet near their field. Kristina would have liked to cool her own body in this heat but she felt it could be dangerous for her to bathe in the lake while she was pregnant. She asked Robert to go with the children and see that they didn’t go too far out.
After the noon meal Robert said that he would like to go out and wander about in the forest; he wanted to go and see the Indian cliff where he had gone hunting when he was home.
Kristina remembered to warn him that a fatal accident had taken place last spring below the Indian. An American settler from Hay Lake had been found dead under a boulder which had fallen on him. The cliff was cracking and new blocks were falling in big piles all the time. It took only a small stone to kill a person, if it happened to hit the head; he must be careful and not go too near the Indian.
Robert smiled, exposing his gaping gums. He was not a settler; he had not stolen any land from the brown people; he didn’t believe the Indian would fling any stones on an innocent person.
Kristina looked after him as he disappeared in the forest. He had said that he had enough, that he had freed himself of masters and need never move a hand any more. For the rest of his life he wouldn’t have to do anything except enjoy his riches. He could use his time as he wanted and wander about all day long. But Robert was not calling on their new neighbors, the white settlers who had recently moved in, he was calling on the Indian, the brown cliff, where such a strange adventure once had befallen him.
Kristina went into his room to make his bed while he was out. As she turned the pillow she made a discovery: under it lay a watch, with a broad yellow brass chain coiled around it.
She stared in disbelief. Cautiously she picked up her find. Robert had not displayed a watch since his return. As far as she knew he had never owned a watch. And if he did own one, why didn’t he wear it? Why did he keep it hidden under the pillow of his bed? If he had bought a watch now that he could well afford it, why didn’t he dare show it?
It couldn’t be a stolen watch, she felt sure. But why had he hidden it under his pillow?
She noticed it was a long-used watch; it was nickel-plated, scratched, and badly worn. She put it to her ear: it had stopped. It had stopped at fifteen minutes after twelve, whether at noon or in the night. The key to wind it was fastened to the chain. Perhaps the watch had stopped because it had not been wound, or perhaps the works were broken.
Kristina replaced her find under the pillow after she had made the bed, but her thoughts were occupied with it as she returned to her sewing.
She began basting a coat for Karl Oskar but had barely taken twenty stitches when she saw, through the window, an Indian approaching the house. At first a sense of fear hit her — just now when no menfolk were at home. . The Indian went to the back of the house and came into the kitchen, and then she recognized him; otherwise these brown people were so confusingly alike that she couldn’t tell one from another. This one was a very old Indian with thin, stringy hair, sunken cheeks, and wrinkled skin that reminded her of cracks in dried clay. Last winter during the intense cold he had come several times; she had boiled milk and given it to him. Each time he had sat long by the warmth of the fire. He spoke some kind of English and Karl Oskar had understood that he had been converted to Christianity by some missionaries who preached among the Indians. He insisted he was a hundred and fifty years old but Karl Oskar must have misunderstood him.
As soon as Kristina recognized the caller her fear vanished; this old Indian was not dangerous. He carried something which he handed her with a few grunts. It was a piece of meat, a large shoulder of venison.
The Indian had brought her a gift, and surprised and pleased she thanked him in Swedish: she had just been wondering what to have for supper — what a fine roast this would make!
The old man had carried the piece without any protection and she soon discovered dark spots on the red meat: flies. That looked suspicious in this heat. She smelled: the odor of the meat was also suspicious.
Kristina knew at once that this venison had turned bad; then she also discovered white spots: maggots. But she did not show any sign of this, she dared do nothing but accept the gift. She neither wanted to nor dared hurt the feelings of the Indian. His people did not discriminate between fresh and spoiled food; to an Indian stomach the meat was of course acceptable; the giver would undoubtedly have eaten it willingly. The brown men could stand any kind of food. In that way they were almost like their hogs, who even could eat and digest rattlers.
She smiled at the old Indian and thanked him many times, putting away the venison as if it had been a great and valuable gift. In return she gave him a fresh loaf of their new wheat bread, and he smiled back at her with his broad wrinkled mouth and uttered many grunts that sounded friendly and grateful. They must have been words of thanks in his language.