Escape to Fort Abercrombie

by Candace Simar

  Ryker pulled Mama’s apron tighter over the goose’s flapping wings and held it tight. The giant bird nipped his leg right through the cloth and flailed for release. Ryker stretched his body across the struggling bird.

  It took all Ryker’s strength to hold it down, as Mama plucked handfuls of downy feathers from the gander’s fuzzy backside. She pulled only the smaller, downy feathers, avoiding those with sharp spines. She dropped feathers into an empty sack until the goose’s bumpy skin lay exposed and naked. The gander hissed and struggled, nipping Ryker’s hand.

  “Now, now, gasse,” Mama crooned in the same voice she used with sick children. Ryker repositioned his hold, as Mama plucked along its neck and reached under its wings. “Only a few feathers we take. They’ll grow back. No need to fuss.” The breeze swirled an August snowstorm of pin feathers around them. Katt abandoned her quest for barn swallows and batted a stray feather with nimble paws.

  Mama nodded. Ryker released the half-naked bird in a flurry of wings and angry honking. It was as if the majestic bird felt ashamed. It flapped and sulked behind the outhouse.

  Ryker reached up and jerked a single hair out of his head, wondering if pulling feathers hurt the goose.

  “There now, the gander finished. Fetch me the gas.” Mama pushed blond tendrils beneath her blue kerchief. The embroidered scarf matched the color of her eyes. Before moving to the prairie, Mama wore the kerchief only on special occasions. But when Mama first stepped inside the drab soddy with its dirt walls and floors, she pulled the kerchief from the trunk and announced she would wear it every day. She said they needed a bit of color to cheer them on the prairie.

  “Back home the goats pasture around our mountain cottage,” Mama said with a far-away look in her eyes. “Bestemor, Grandmother, fills the stabbuhr with gjetost brown cheese.”

  Ryker chased and cornered the female goose against the side of the outhouse and brought it to his mother’s waiting hands.

  “Dark winter days, back in Norway,” she said with a sigh. “At least we have sunshine every day on the prairie.”

  Mama never seemed to hurry, but her hands always busied. She spent her days cooking, sewing, washing, cleaning, and making a home in the wilderness. She spent the dark evenings knitting or spinning. How often Ryker had fallen asleep to the music of her clicking needles.

  “Mama,” Ryker said, “someday I will tell stories about the Old Country to my children.” He took a firmer hold on the flailing goose.

  Mama laughed a tinkling laugh, but Ryker noticed the sadness in her eyes. She grabbed the flapping bird and forced its long neck between her knees. Ryker wrapped Mama’s apron around its wings and head in defense of the nipping beak. She grimaced, clutching her side.

  “Are you all right?” Ryker said. Lately Mama complained of feeling poorly.

  “I’m fine.” She waved a feathered hand. “Bestemor made many a down comforter. Nothing warmer for cold nights.” She took a deep breath and began plucking more feathers. “Of course, we had a huge flock of geese. Enough to sell barrels of feathers to the village store.”

  Mama told stories about their Norwegian homeland as they plucked feathers. Once she paused to wipe a tear from her cheek.

  “Are you sick?” Ryker said as the near-naked goose ran behind the barn.

  “Homesick,” Mama said with a laugh. “Nothing serious.”

  Papa strode up to the yard wearing a worried expression. His face was smudged black, and his old straw hat carried a hole from a rat bite.

  “Something troubles Brimstone,” he said, wiping sweat off his forehead with the back of his shirtsleeve. It left a black streak across the faded linen cloth. Fire and Brimstone were their oxen team. Papa had worked an entire winter at a Wisconsin logging camp to pay for them before they moved to western Minnesota. Losing an ox would be far worse than losing a haystack.

  “He’s choking,” Papa said. “Ryker, come.”

  Ryker dared not refuse his father’s command but looked toward his mother with a helpless gesture. Her face was lined with fatigue, and the slouch of her shoulders showed exhaustion. Papa must have noticed, too, for he leaned over and kissed Mama on the top of her head.

  “What’s wrong?” Papa said.

  “Go along,” Mama said. She clutched her side again. “I’ll manage.”

  “Maybe Klara could help,” Ryker said, though Klara, Sven’s nine-year-old twin, was terrified of hissing geese and not strong enough to do much good.

  “She took Elsa to the garden,” Mama said. “Don’t worry. I’ll be all right.”

  Ryker ran to catch up with Papa on the other side of the barn.

  Brimstone shook his massive head from side to side, and drool dripped from the sides of his mouth. From time to time he made a choking sound and the muscles of his throat rippled beneath his black and white spotted hide. “Hold him while I take a look.”

  Ryker stood to the side, careful lest the ox trample his bare feet, and grabbed hold of the curved horns, as his father poked a stick between its back teeth and pried open the ox’s mouth. The beast lowed and bellowed, as Papa stuck his fingers between its teeth and felt the back of its throat. “I feel something stuck but can’t see it.”

  Ryker used all his weight to pull back the restless beast’s head as Papa peered into his mouth. “I hope it’s not a piece of wire,” Papa said. “My God, it couldn’t happen at a worse time.” He shoved his fingers deeper into the ox’s throat. It gagged a horrible wheezing sound.

  “A turnip?” Papa grasped a green leaf. “A whole damn turnip stuck in his throat.” He jerked a green stem, and it broke off in his hand. “Damnation! Hold him tighter.”

  Ryker used all his weight to steady the ox’s head, but he was no match for its massive strength.

  “Hold him, I said.” Papa reached deeper into the ox’s throat. “I almost got it.” He jammed his entire hand down the ox’s throat. It gagged, flailing to get away. Then the huge beast swallowed the turnip in a single, strangled gulp.

  “Good God, no,” Papa said. He loosed a string of words that would make a preacher blush. “He’ll founder, for sure.”

  Brimstone pulled away and stood trembling with his head down. Fire, the other ox, nuzzled Brimstone’s side as if in sympathy, then lifted his tail, and did his business with a splat. Ryker stepped out of the way, wrinkling his nose at the smell.

  “Are you sure it was a turnip?” Ryker said. He examined the bit of slimy green stem thrown to the ground. It could have been any plant.

  His father gave him a look of disdain. “What kind of farmer will you make if you don’t know your elbow from a turnip green?”

  Papa swore until he ran out of bad words and then shook his fist toward heaven. “Do you see me, Old Woman? You wanted me to have land, and, by God, I have it now. What good is it? I should have starved in Norway for all the luck I’ve had in this damned country.”

  Bestemor had urged Papa and Mama to come to America. Papa always blamed his mother when things went wrong, even though she now slept in the Norwegian churchyard. Ryker remembered her soft lap and tight knot of hair at the back of her neck. The old woman had smelled of cheese and sour milk. It made no sense for Papa to blame his dead mother for a choking ox.

  Ryker knew better than speak when Papa was mad. Instead, he planned his future. Ryker would be a professor, a scholar, or even a poet. He couldn’t wait to leave the farm. Of course, he would miss Mama, but he wouldn’t miss Papa at all.

  His father returned to the ox, jerked back its head, and looked down its throat again.

  “If I know my business, he’ll bloat.” Papa screwed up his mouth in concentration. “How did he get into the turnips?” He looked at Ryker with a piercing glance.

  “Don’t look at me,” Ryker said. It was always Papa’s way to find and fix blame.

  At that time, Baby Elsa toddled by. Klara, Sven’s twin sister, followed, holding several turnips in her hand.

  “Did you give turnips to the oxen?” Papa thundered. />
  Klara cringed before his angry words. She first shook her head. Then she slowly nodded, as the tears dripped down her thin face. She was taller than Sven but had the same white hair and blue eyes. Her faded dress hung above her knees, she had grown so tall.

  “He was hungry,” she blubbered.

  “Good God, girl,” Papa said. “Are you trying to ruin me?” He unbuckled his belt. “You know better than to go near the team.” The look of terror in Klara’s eyes made Ryker’s insides shiver.

  Ryker should do something. Martin would have gone toe to toe with Papa and gotten away with it. He’d done it before, that time Klara spilled the night pot, and when she let the baby get too near the fire. But Ryker just stood there and watched the strap blaze a red mark across his sister’s skinny legs as she yelped in pain. Baby Elsa screamed and ran into the weeds by the coop.

  “Enough, Johann,” Mama said, coming toward the pen. She always showed up when Papa lost his temper. “It was an accident.” She scooped up the baby from the weeds and smoothed Elsa’s wispy hair. “Come to the house, Klara. We must find Patsy’s nest.”

  Klara fled sobbing after her mother. Ryker felt a surge of hatred toward his father and his cruel ways. Papa had laughed at Martin’s escapades. And it seemed Papa was less stringent with Sven. Ryker and Klara took the brunt of his father’s bad moods. Mama said it was just Papa’s way and did not mean he loved them less.

  Their family used to be happy. Ryker carried a wonderful memory of riding on Papa’s shoulders to the fish market in Norway. Papa danced a jig and sang songs about bears and trolls, then pretended to be a bear and chased Sissel and Bertina into the house. Papa quit laughing after smallpox took both girls. And then the difficult move to America, their time grubbing stumps in Dodge County, their first hungry winter on the prairie, and Martin running away to join the Union. Maybe they would find happiness again when the war ended and Martin returned home.

  Papa cinched his belt and returned to the ox. The storm ended. Ryker watched while Papa felt under the ox’s belly and around the sides of its chest. Funny that Papa wasn’t as tender with his children as with the animals. “We should have stayed in Norway.” Papa shook his head. “We’re ruined.”

  Overhead the clouds drifted into ribbons and wispy tails.

  “I’ll leave Brimstone to you,” Papa said. Sweat dripped muddy rivulets down his dirty face and off the edge of his beard. “God knows how we’d replace him.”

  “What can I do?” Ryker’s voice quivered. Papa said things only once. Maybe Papa had already told him, and Ryker hadn’t paid attention. Ryker braced himself, but Papa seemed pleased with Ryker’s question. He pulled a folding knife from the front pocket of his overalls and handed it to Ryker with a stern warning not to lose it.

  “Watch him like a mother over a sick child.” Papa motioned Ryker closer. He pointed to a white spot on Brimstone’s side. “Stick him when he bloats.” Papa shouldered his scythe. “He’ll die if you don’t.”

  Ryker stood silently, holding the knife in his hand. The Schmitz heifer had once foundered in their cornfield. Johnny bragged how his father allowed him to push a blade into the heifer’s flank. That heifer survived, and everyone knew Johnny was as clumsy as a bear.

  Ryker imagined jabbing the knife into poor Brimstone’s side. Would it draw blood? Would it hurt the poor animal? What if he stabbed too deep, or too shallow? Ryker faced consequences if he did something wrong, missed obeying his father to the letter, daydreamed and forgot to concentrate. “What if I poke the wrong place?” Ryker asked as his father tied a lead rope on Fire to return to his field work. Poor Fire must do the work of both oxen.

  “You won’t.” Papa stepped closer and patted Brimstone’s flank. “Aim for this white patch. You can do it.”

  Ryker wasn’t sure that he could.

  Papa with Fire in tow was twenty rods away when he turned and called back to Ryker. “And for God’s sake, watch the little ones before they do something else to ruin us.”

  The task felt like a thundercloud hanging over his head.

  CHAPTER 3

  * * *

  Papa was right. Brimstone bloated within the hour. Ryker took the knife from his pocket, relieved that he had not lost it, gritted his teeth, and jabbed the ox in the center of the white patch on his lower side.

  Brimstone bellowed and kicked. Ryker had not expected the stinky cloud of gas that hissed into his face from the puncture. Ryker turned and retched, as Brimstone went running into the tall grass. It hadn’t hurt the poor animal. Though he felt sick to his stomach, Ryker felt proud. He had done it. He would save the ox if it were the last thing he did.

  The prairie rolled around him like a green carpet, but this time of the year, Ryker could not see over the grass to enjoy the view. He sometimes climbed to the top of the willow tree next to their house for a better look. The prairie reminded him of the rolling ocean waves. Ryker had been five years old during their ocean voyage to America, but the image imprinted on his mind as clearly as a painting hanging on a wall.

  The prairie moved like that ocean, wave after wave of dipping and blowing grass. The ocean waves rolled blue, gray, and green. The prairie showed green, yellow, or blue, with pink splashes of wild roses. It turned gold in the dry season and after the first frost. Like the ocean, the prairie was never still, always tickled and pushed by the winds that swept in from the west.

  The image brought words for another story into his mind.

  He pushed through the tall grass, like a jungle, following the path left by the ox. He pretended to be a safari hunter in Africa. He followed the sound of the ox charging through the thick grass, pretending he followed an elephant. Meadowlarks sang, and the sounds of spring peepers grew louder as he followed the ox to the far edge of the slough, a marshy spot hidden from their farmstead by cattails.

  Brimstone wallowed in muddy water up to his knees, chewing on water lilies. A dab of dried blood showed in the middle of the white spot like a bull’s-eye. Brimstone dipped his nose into the green scum floating on the water. Then the ox turned reproachful eyes toward Ryker.

  “I’m saving your life,” Ryker said. “You don’t have to be mad.”

  Ryker waded into the cool mud of the slough, stretching his toes and swatting mosquitoes. How good it felt to be away from his pesky brother and demanding father. Ryker remembered living in a real house with windows and white walls, clean floors, and real beds. Life in the soddy crammed all of them together without a moment’s privacy. Today brought the unexpected gift of being alone.

  The grasses dipped like peasants before a king. The thought pleased him, though Ryker knew better than to share this image. His father would tell him to get his head out of his hinder and concentrate on his work. Ryker might share a poem with Teacher, but Papa wouldn’t let them attend school until after harvest. Mrs. Tingvold always had a three-week summer session in August. Mama said going to school was the only way for the children to succeed in America. Sometimes she got her way.

  The only English word he knew that rhymed with peasants was pheasants. It seemed impossible to add a bird to his poem. Mrs. Tingvold once shared a newspaper article about pheasants. She sketched its graceful tail, explaining how the exotic birds were found in city zoos and in the yards of rich people.

  Someday Ryker would be rich and have pheasants, even peacocks, strutting around his yard. He would have enough hens to cook eggs for breakfast every day of the year. He would have two cows, to ensure a steady milk supply, enough to drink without watering it down. And butter to spare. And flour, bread, and cake every day.

  Overhead a mountain of white cloud billowed against a clear, blue sky. A bittern harrumphed at the far edge of the slough, and Ryker strained to get a look at the large bird blending into the cattails. He spied it standing still as a stone with its beak held straight up among the reeds, singing its deep, gulping melody.

  He and Martin had often played in the slough, having mud fights and trying to swim in the shallow water
. Afterwards they picked bloodsuckers from their legs and feet, plastering mud on their many mosquito bites. Lately, Ryker tried not to think about his older brother.

  Martin and Frank Schmitz ran away to join the army last summer, though they were only sixteen and lied about their ages. Papa stormed over to the fort and demanded Martin’s release. Many boys lied about their ages, and the Union needed every one. At least that’s what Captain Vander Horck told Papa at Fort Abercrombie. The enlistment was only for three months, he had said. Martin would be home before winter.

  Winter came and went, and Martin was still gone. Mama blamed Papa that Martin ran away in the first place. Sometimes, when they were supposed to be asleep, Ryker heard them argue. Mama said that Papa should have been firm with Captain Vander Horck and demanded Martin’s return. Papa argued that nothing would keep a sixteen-year-old boy home if he didn’t want to stay.

  The heavy weight of Martin’s chores fell on Ryker and Sven. Of course, Klara took care of their baby sister. She also kept the manure pail filled with dried cow pies for fuel and watched over Marigold.

  Elsa toddled away if left alone for even a second. She always had the croup or earache, fussing and crying from morning until night. And Marigold’s escape into the Schmitz’s barley field had earned poor Klara a good switching. Every day Klara chased after the cow and baby until she wore down to a frazzle.

  Ryker sighed and wished for a book to read. His stomach growled. He reached over to the edge of the swamp and plucked pink rose petals. They tasted tart like sweet lemons, or maybe oranges. Once, in Norway, they had each received a whole orange for Christmas. Ryker couldn’t exactly remember how oranges tasted, but he remembered the feeling of sticky juice dripping down his chin.