Poor dear, Miss McEwing clucks softly. She’s exhausted.
Mr. Clayton chuckles. Hard work being a chaperone.
CHAPTER TEN
A Wedding to Remember
School is out and there are sunny days aplenty, and fresh berries and crawfish to fill our bellies after months of salted fish and potatoes.
On our farm we have a picnic and folks arrive by rowboat. The Norts bring their new baby girl, and everyone stands around admiring her. They’ve named her May Amelia after me.
Just what we need, Ivan groans. Another May Amelia.
The men talk and smoke their pipes. Old Man Weilen is there and he eyes me suspiciously.
Whose boy are you? he asks.
I ain’t no boy, I say. I’m May Amelia Jackson, Mr. Weilen.
Jacksons? They just got boys, he says.
I’m a girl.
Whatcha doing in overalls then?
You think this Stanley outfit is a good investment, Jalmer? Berle Holumbo’s father asks Pappa.
Pappa says, Joo.
Mr. Petersen claps my father on the back and says, Jalmer Jackson has enough sisu to drive the Russians from Finland!
I remember the gold rush, Old Man Weilen says to me. I was just a boy.
Did you find any gold? I ask him.
He frowns and says, I was too late. It’d all been dug up by the time I got there.
Maybe you didn’t dig in the right places, I say.
His filmy eyes focus on me in confusion. Whose Boy Are You?
There’s just no talking to him, so I go into the kitchen where the women are gathered. Jane is talking to Mamma. Helmi sits in the middle of the floor, rolling empty cans back and forth.
Jane looks tired and frustrated. She says, He does not know where he is anymore.
My husband was the same way, the old widow, Mrs. Paarvala says. It’s hard.
This morning he didn’t know who I was and thought I was trying to steal from him. He almost shot me, Jane admits.
He thinks I’m a boy! I say.
Mamma laughs and says, If you’d put on a dress once in a while, you’d look like a girl.
What can I do? Jane asks.
Mamma looks down at Helmi and says, Treat him like a child because that is what he is now.
The tables are groaning with all sorts of Finn treats—squeaky cheese, pickled salmon, fruit soup, and sour cream which we call viili. I pile my plate high with food then I go and sit between Lonny and Jaakko.
I’ll bring Bosie back tomorrow, Jaakko tells me. You need him more than me.
Why? I ask.
I heard the men talking. They said your pappa will be rich soon.
Yes indeed, I say.
When you have money, people want to take it, he says darkly.
How’s your kitten doing? I ask Lonny.
He wipes his arm across his face and says, A cougar ate her.
I say, My cat Buttons got burned down in the barn.
No she didn’t, he says.
She did so, I say.
She’s living in our shed, he insists.
My mouth drops open in disbelief. Your shed?
Yep, he says. And her kittens, too. That’s why I’m not so sad about my kitten getting ate. I got a whole load of kittens to myself.
I leap up. Come on! I want to get her right now!
Buttons is curled up in a washtub hidden in the shed behind Lonny’s barn. Her kittens are rolling around her. She looks up at me and blinks.
Buttons! I cry, and grab her up and give her a squeeze. I swear the fleas leap onto me, but I don’t care none.
Can I keep the kittens at least? Lonny pleads.
I can’t believe you’ve been here all along! I exclaim, and then frown at Lonny. Why didn’t you tell me she wasn’t dead?
I didn’t know she was supposed to be dead! He narrows his eyes at me. You ain’t gonna kill her, are you?
I just sigh.
The sun sinks and Wilho Saari, the best kantele player, strikes up a tune and folks start dancing.
Miss McEwing sits next to me.
This is a fine party, she declares.
Mr. Clayton walks up to us, carrying a pie.
That pie for me? I ask him.
Not exactly, he says.
Then he gets down on one knee and swallows hard.
Agnes, he says. I haven’t got a ring, but I can make a pie. Will you marry me?
Miss McEwing’s lips tremble and she says, Yes, Jacob, I would be delighted!
Then she throws herself into his arms. Mr. Clayton kisses my teacher soundly and every bachelor frowns.
So you’re the Perfect Man, I say to Mr. Clayton.
There are no perfect men, May Amelia, he says.
I could’ve told him that.
Folks stay up all night dancing, and children sleep wherever they fall. In the morning everybody leaves, but Uncle Niihlo returns in the afternoon with Jaakko and Bosie.
Bosie! I cry to my scruffy little dog.
Uncle Niihlo walks up to my mother and says, Alma, it’s time for me to take her back.
Right now? Mamma gasps.
I’m gonna rent out my house and we’re going to live at the logging camp, Uncle Niihlo says. They’re offering free room and board. I can save more money that way.
The logging camp’s dangerous for a child! Who will watch her? Mamma asks.
There’s another family up there. Lady said she’d look after her for me.
Mamma looks as if she’s going to burst into tears, but she bites her lip.
Helmi cries and cries until finally Jaakko walks over to his sister and kneels in front of her and whispers in her ear. She stops crying at once.
What’d you tell her? I ask him.
That we got candy back at the house. She likes sweets.
That night, Wilbert and I are back in our room. The sound of Mamma’s weeping carries through the walls.
Alma, Pappa says, he’s her father. It will be better for the boy. Those logging men won’t look twice at that neck of his.
But she’s just a little girl! my mother sobs.
I turn to Wilbert.
She wasn’t hers to keep, I say.
Helmi was just like one of Buttons’s kittens, Wilbert says.
You mean she had fleas?
No, May, Wilbert says. She was easy to love.
* * *
Mamma hardly has time to miss little Helmi because she goes off to catch a baby and help the new mother. I think she is happy to leave us sometimes because of the loneliness of this place. Mamma says that she dreams of being able to walk out her door and talk to another woman instead of getting in a boat.
Wilbert and Isaiah and me are out in the fields checking on the sheeps. Our sheeps have no sense at all and are always getting snagged on blackberry bushes and tearing themselves up real good.
Isaiah, I say, I think this here sheep is sweet on this other one. He’s always following her around.
Maybe I’ll start calling them Mr. Clayton and Miss McEwing, Isaiah muses.
I think you should call them Berle and May Amelia, Wilbert says.
Humph, I say to Wilbert.
Jane is walking across the field toward us, her face worried.
Have you seen Mr. Weilen? she asks. He’s been missing for a day now.
He was in the back pasture for a little while, Isaiah says. I’ll go check and see if he’s still there.
Jane looks relieved, and I say loudly, Isaiah, she means Mr. Weilen the Person, not Mr. Weilen the Sheep.
He reddens. Oh, sorry.
You named a sheep after my husband? Jane asks raising an eyebrow.
Least he didn’t name a pig after him, Wilbert says.
Old Man Weilen turns up a few days later. He’d wandered up to the logging camp and got confused and lost his way in the woods. One of the men found him and brought him back home.
Miss McEwing and Mr. Clayton’s wedding is the event of the season. Because her people live so far a
way, the couple get married here in Nasel at the church. Miss McEwing asks me if I will hold her bouquet during the ceremony.
Does this mean I have to wear a dress? I ask.
I’m afraid it does, she says, and even though I can think of Nothing Worse, I say Yes, because she is my favorite teacher ever.
The day of the wedding arrives and Mamma stuffs me into a scratchy dress and the boys slick back their hair and scrub their fingernails. Miss McEwing is the most beautiful bride I have ever seen. Mr. Clayton cleans up nicely, too, and he promises me that he won’t help birth any calves today and ruin his nice clothes.
At the church, the preacher says, Does anybody have any objections to these two people being married?
Every last one of us kids stands up and says, We Do.
The church goes hush-silent and Miss McEwing looks stunned and the preacher says, What exactly is your objection?
If she gets married, she can’t be our teacher no more! I say. It’s the rules.
Miss McEwing looks down and laughs and the preacher says, That’s Not A Good Enough Reason, I’m Afraid.
But we love her, I say.
Oh May Amelia, Miss McEwing says. You’ll be losing me as a teacher, but you’ll be getting me as a neighbor.
It’s not the same, I say.
Please sit down, all of you, the preacher orders us, which just goes to show how nobody listens to children, not even preachers.
There is a party after and instead of a wedding cake, Mr. Clayton has made a wedding pie.
Sorry about stealing your teacher away, Mr. Clayton says to me. A good wife is hard to find.
A good teacher is even harder to find, I reply.
A good husband is impossible to find, Mrs. Paarvala adds.
The party ends, and we go back to the farm, but not to bed, for we children are going to do a shivaree on Mr. Clayton and Miss McEwing. A shivaree is when you go and make a ruckus and all sorts of noise outside the newlyweds’ house. We get pots and buckets and cowbells and Ivan and Alvin bring their guns. I take my favorite milking tin bucket and an enamel spoon. Mr. Clayton may have stolen our teacher, but we’re gonna steal their good night’s sleep.
It’s a long walk in the dark and Isaiah leads the way. He is worse than any sheep for he gets us tangled in bushes and lost and finally Kaarlo takes charge.
Kaarlo says, They’re gonna have babies already if we keep on following you.
We are nearly at the house when we hear a shot.
I told you not to shoot until I said so, Kaarlo says to the twins.
Wasn’t us, Alvin says.
Then who was it? Kaarlo asks, and there’s another shot and we hear Miss McEwing scream.
Do you think somebody is already giving them a shivaree? I ask.
Maybe Berle? Wilbert suggests.
Kaarlo says, May Amelia, go on and peek in the window to see if someone’s beat us here.
Sure enough Somebody did get here before us and that Somebody is Old Man Weilen. He doesn’t look like he’s in a joking mood the way he’s waving around his gun at poor Miss McEwing and Mr. Clayton who are in bed wearing their nightclothes. Mr. Clayton, who survived The Most Unpleasant War looks perfectly terrified.
That’s My Wife! Old Man Weilen shouts, waving his gun.
Come on now, Mr. Clayton says in a soothing voice. You’re just a little confused. You’re just—
Old Man Weilen shoots right into the ceiling and shouts, I Ain’t Confused! That’s My Wife!
Miss McEwing cries, I’m Not Your Wife!
I scamper back to the boys.
Well? Kaarlo asks. Did Berle beat us here?
It ain’t Berle! It’s Old Man Weilen!
Old Man Weilen is doing a shivaree on Mr. Clayton and Miss McEwing? Wilbert asks.
No! He thinks Miss McEwing is his wife! He’s gone crazy!
We should get Pappa, Isaiah says but there’s another shot and Miss McEwing screams and I say, We Got To Save Them!
But what do we do? Wilbert asks.
Kaarlo looks at me and smiles and says, I have a plan.
* * *
Kaarlo’s Plan is for me to distract Old Man Weilen so that he and the twins can get through the window and knock him down, which I don’t think is much of a plan but nobody asked my opinion. As I walk through the front door of Mr. Clayton’s house, I can’t help but wonder if the Real Plan is to Get Rid Of Me because Old Man Weilen looks more ornery than Friendly.
May Amelia! Miss McEwing gasps.
Hiya, Miss McEwing, I say. Hiya, Mr. Clayton.
Mr. Clayton shouts, Get Out Of Here! But it’s too late and Old Man Weilen whirls on me.
Hiya, Mr. Weilen.
Whose boy are you? he asks.
I ain’t no boy, I say. I’m May Amelia Jackson.
Jacksons? They just got boys, he says.
No, sir, I say. They got me, too.
What are you doing here? he asks belligerently, and behind him I see Kaarlo’s face in the window.
What are you doing here? I ask him.
He cocks his head at me, and his face is full of confusion like he is a lost child.
I, he says, his lower lip trembling, I—
Behind him Kaarlo is raising the milking bucket and is about to bring it right down on the old fella’s head when I say, You came for pie?
Old Man Weilen blinks and says, That’s right. I came for pie.
Kaarlo hesitates, and I say to Old Man Weilen, Come on out to the kitchen, and the old man drops his gun and follows me like a docile lamb.
I sit him down and give him a piece of pie which he eats happily.
Oh May Amelia! Miss McEwing says. You were so brave!
Mr. Clayton gives a low whistle and says, Brave? That was a foolish thing you did, May Amelia.
Wasn’t my idea, I say.
Old Man Weilen pauses midbite and looks at me. Whose boy are you?
I sigh.
I’m Jalmer Jackson’s boy, I say.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The Right Hand
All the Finnish ladies like to keep a clean house and Mamma is no exception. Pappa says that the spiders don’t stand a chance against my mother’s broom.
We have been cleaning all day long—sweeping and scrubbing pots with hemlock branches. Mamma is cleaning the stove with a fresh seagull wing from the bird Ivan shot for her for that morning. She swears it’s the best way to clean the stove, but I still feel sorry for the poor seagull.
I polish the floor with skim milk to make it shine.
Not much point if you ask me, I say to Mamma. It’ll just get dirty right quick again with all the boys and their boots.
You may be right, May Amelia, she says.
Mamma, I say, when we are rich, we can hire a girl to clean the house.
She straightens, rubbing her back. No one will clean your house as well as you. How was Jane when you saw her?
I took fresh-baked bread and some of Mamma’s blackberry preserves to Jane earlier this morning. Old Man Weilen’s mind never returned after the night of the shivaree, and so Jane had to send him to the hospital in Astoria. He escaped a week later and got killed when a wagon ran him over. Poor Jane is a widow now. It feels strange not to see the old man sitting on the porch asking me whose boy I am.
She’s sad, I say. She misses him bad.
It was a blessing, Mamma says. Believe me, there are worse things than dying, May Amelia.
Alvin bursts in the door, his muddy feet tracking across all my hard work.
Alvin! I shout at him. You’re making a mess!
Ivan’s hurt! he shouts, and that’s when I notice the blood on his overalls, like he just got finished slaughtering chickens, and I know something bad has happened.
Mamma grabs her birthing bag and says May Amelia, Fetch As Many Cobwebs As You Can.
Everyone knows that cobwebs are good at stopping bleeding. I go running to the shed since there’s no chance of there being a web in the house after us cleaning.
&nb
sp; By the time we get to the camp, they’ve got Ivan laid out on one of the wooden tables where the men eat, and Uncle Niihlo is holding his hand and saying It’ll Be Okay, Son. Ivan’s hand is wrapped in a bloody flour sack and his leg is propped at an angle that no leg should be. He is moaning with pain.
What happened? Mamma demands.
He fell between two logs and got smashed up good, Uncle Niihlo says. I’m so sorry, Alma.
Let me see his hand, Mamma orders in the no-nonsense voice she uses on birthing mothers.
The kind cook who bandaged my leg unwraps the bloody fabric and Mamma gasps, because it’s plain as day that all the cobwebs in the world aren’t gonna save my brother’s hand. It’s been ground to bits and barely looks like a hand at all.
Ivan shrieks in pain, and Mamma drops her bag and walks out of the hall. I run after her.
Where are you going, Mamma?
I Cannot Bear To Bury Another Child, she says, every word clear. My mother walks into the thick woods, and she never looks back.
* * *
The men get Ivan down the mountain and Uncle Aarno and Pappa take him to Astoria, where the doctor sets his leg. But they can do nothing for his hand and they must chop it off or it will rot and then Ivan will die. Alvin stays by his twin’s side the entire time.
When Ivan finally comes home, he’s thin and pale and there’s just a stump of bandages where his right hand used to be. He is a different boy. He cannot even be bothered to be mean to me anymore and I almost miss it, for the new Ivan is weird and lost. Everything is hard for him and I hear him sob when he tries to pick up his gun with his one good hand. At meals he must rely on his twin to cut up his food. Alvin trails after him everywhere like a worried mother hen.
Isaiah, who is clever, takes a glove and stuffs it with batting so that when it’s tied onto the end of Ivan’s stump, it looks like a hand. But it doesn’t work like one.
At suppertime, Wendell says, Can you pass the potatoes, Ivan?
Alvin reaches out to grab the bowl of potatoes, but Ivan bangs the table with his stump and snaps, He asked me to pass him the potatoes!
We all watch as Ivan struggles to pick up the bowl with his good left hand and the glove stump, but it goes clattering to the floor, boiled potatoes rolling everywhere. Ivan tears off the glove and throws it across the room.
The Trouble with May Amelia Page 8
