Agassiz Stories

by Sandra Birdsell

  “I’ll give the money for the train tickets back to John,” she’d told Henry at the hospital. She meant to say, don’t you worry now. She was surprised when he responded. He moved his hand across the blanket towards her own.

  “Seed,” he said. “John should be spending money for seed, not trips.” His voice came from a great distance. And she thought again, it is a dream. I’ll open my eyes and be in my room upstairs.

  She held his curled fingers lightly between her large hands. “I’ll tell him you said so.” Their son wasn’t a farmer. He owned a large implement dealership in Reinfeld. Henry was confused, or was he saying, tell John to look after things?

  “John spends entirely too much money,” Henry said, and Elizabeth thought that maybe his illness wasn’t so bad after all, if he could still think to speak out against John. But several hours later, Henry grew too weak to talk and he sank into sleep.

  Elizabeth turned from the telephone. The bad news would keep for a while. She read the words she’d written on the calendar. She picked up the pencil which dangled from its string and in tiny, controlled letters she wrote, “All day it snowed.” She would train herself to live alone.

  She switched on the stove and filled the kettle with water. The mantle clock in the dining room chimed the hour. She went into the room and turned on the light as though that would lessen the effect of the clock’s counting. All around the walls on varnished shelves was her collection of china plates. She didn’t like china, but it was what other women did. John and Sharon were delighted. They never knew what to buy for her and so they bought a plate from each place they visited. She had a plate with a picture of the Niagara Falls on it. When she’d seen John’s slides of the falls, they made her feel like the bonging of the clock made her feel, off balance and clutching the air about her. “Horseshoe Falls,” the plate was inscribed, “160 feet high, 2,950 feet wide, 500,000 tons of water a minute,” which to her was the same as saying, “every second a baby is born.” It was unfathomable.

  But it wasn’t these plates she’d come searching for, but for something older, something that came from a different time. She found it on the shelf in the china cupboard, the porcelain cup and saucer that had come from Russia. Her mother had brought it with her and had written down that she was to have it when she married. She felt its smoothness against the thick calluses of her palms and took the cup into the kitchen. She filled it with hot water and sat down at the table and pressed its fluted edge to her lips. She looked out the window. The moon had risen and beneath it stretched the winter-blue curve of Henry’s fields. Before she’d begun to work in the greenhouses, she’d preferred winter. She’d never been able to face the stark bleakness of Henry’s fields without feeling numbed by the ugliness. She hated how she’d battled daily the wind that swept in under windowsills, covering everything with gritty black silt. Her headaches used to come with those high winds. She preferred the depression that the immense stillness of winter carried because in winter, it was clean. She massaged her chest where an odd ache had begun to form and thought about who she should telephone. She should really try to get hold of John just in case he had come home from the city a day earlier than expected and heard about his father. And then she realized that if that happened, he would call her. She didn’t have the energy to call John and face the questions he would ask, not letting her finish saying what she’d formed in her mind. Should she call Mika? No, her sister seemed to enjoy hearing bad news and would grab hold of the information and make it seem worse than it really was. Irma. Irma worked in the greenhouses with her. Better to call Irma because Irma understood. She was married to a cranky, bitter man who had lost his legs. And she, eyelids heavy with the thought of it, was married to Henry who today had entered his own place. She had lost his mind.

  Elizabeth opened her eyes, realized it was morning and was amazed that she’d slept so soundly. The first thing she saw was Henry’s boots on the carpet across the room, beside his bed, and she remembered a week ago, Henry walking three miles to Hank P.’s place. To keep him talking in the barn long enough until the polls closed to prevent Hank P., who was Liberal, from casting his vote. What did you talk about for such a long time? she’d asked, her heart doing its familiar flip flop each time he’d come back from talking with Hank P. We talked about God, and what He means to me, Henry said.

  Everything is lawful, Henry often said, but not everything is good and so they were one of few left in the farming area around Reinfeld who didn’t have the tell-tale television antenna on top of their roof. Occasionally, she drove into town and watched Ed Sullivan at Irma’s place. She had never been able to match Henry’s goodness, she thought, as her eyes met his Bible lying on the table beside his bed. She went into what used to be John’s bedroom, her sewing room, and stood looking for a moment at the dress pattern spread across the worktable, pieces cut in half lengthwise so that she could add tissue, enlarge the pattern to fit. Yes, that’s how it is, she told herself, eating and drinking and never thinking that tomorrow it could all end. She felt guilty immediately. I’m beginning to sound more and more like Mika, she chastened herself, it’s a stroke, he could come out of it yet. Above her worktable, the window where she’d been standing when it had happened. She dressed and went downstairs and erased the vacation plans from the calendar. She didn’t allow herself to ask how she felt about this. What had happened had happened. It wasn’t Henry’s fault that she would never get to see the falls. She had nothing to complain about when it came to Henry. She often said to Irma with a clear heart that she had no complaints at all.

  Except for the farm, Irma reminded her when she’d said, Henry is all right, I have no complaints. Henry was seventy-two, she forty-seven. Most men his age had already built their retirement houses in Reinfeld, erected fake windmills in their back yards, wishing wells in the front yards, constructed sturdy fences and died. But neither one of them had wanted that. Henry secretly hoped that John would still take up the farm and she, when Mr. Ellis had confided in her his intention to sell, that they would sell the farm and buy the greenhouses. And so when Irma reminded her, “except for the farm,” the frustration and desperation of past years was as fresh and tart as an unripe apple. The farm wasn’t hers to sell. Do, don’t ask, Irma said once. Just tell. Irma’s husband had no legs, she didn’t need to ask for anything, she thought, as she plaited her long auburn hair. She watched herself do this, saw her awkward fingers fumbling with the tiny pins, her face, rounder; she’d been gaining weight. The mirror told her what she still didn’t feel completely: you are here, real, alive, and Henry is the one asleep.

  Before she telephoned John, she called the hospital and asked, how is he? The same, the nurse said. He spent a quiet night. Henry was too quiet. His falling was like a feather resting among feathers. She telephoned John and gave him the news and arranged to meet him at the hospital. When she hung up some of the tension that had gathered in her shoulder blades fled. She picked up the pencil and wrote, “My first day alone” and beneath that, “Phone Mr. Ellis soon.”

  In mid-February, as Elizabeth turned off from the highway onto the road that led to Reinfeld, the sun sparkled on crusty snow and on rooftops and she thought Reinfeld looked like a Christmas card picture of Bethlehem shining with the blue tinge of a pointing star, making it special, set apart, unlike the other towns that hugged the American border. The highway didn’t pass through Reinfeld’s centre, splitting it in two. It wasn’t necessary to string gaudy lights above the street or to have a sign that said, “Welcome to Reinfeld.” Its borders were symmetrical, the streets, predictable, and the sameness in the decoration of the houses made her feel that nothing would ever change. She drove towards the hospital thinking that despite everything, she was content.

  She walked into Henry’s room. He looked at her, blinked several times and said, “Chicks. Have you ordered the chicks yet?”

  “What?” Elizabeth asked, startled. Her own dream-like state had diminished and she had reconciled herself to hi
s, that it was permanent. His place had become real. The walls were green. His cubicle had a tall, narrow window that looked out over the town of Reinfeld. A brass radiator beneath it. Beside his bed, a wooden one-drawer chest, painted brown. Above it, a mirror. Henry, in a wheelchair, staring down at the curled fingers in his lap, a towel tied beneath his arms to hold him upright. Henry’s white legs, thinner, dangling uselessly as the attendant lifted him in and out of bed. Because she was strong and healthy, Henry’s place seemed confined. But she knew the effort it took for him just to breathe and so she knew that for him, it was the right size. But now, his voice a whisper, but his voice, saying to her, “Chicks, have you ordered the chicks yet?”

  She’d called Mr. Ellis and had gone back to work transplanting tomatoes and her life had become routine. She was confident enough to try variations to the old pattern, sleeping in past seven o’clock, staying up later at night, continuing the nightly ritual of drinking hot water from the porcelain cup that had come from Russia.

  “He spoke to me,” Elizabeth said to the nurse. She’d run from the room, grabbed hold of the first person she came upon.

  “Oh, he speaks often,” the nurse said. “Especially during the night. He talks about an accident. We feel that he hears things.”

  “Things, what things?” Accident and chicks. Her face grew flushed.

  “Oh, the other patients, their radios.”

  They should have told her. Prepared her for the time when he would begin to ask questions. How did it happen? Did I fall? And then, what about Hank P? How did that one happen?

  “And that’s not all,” the nurse said as she followed Elizabeth back into Henry’s room. “We have a surprise for you. Show your wife what you can do,” she said to Henry and for the first time, Elizabeth noticed the metal bar hanging above his bed.

  Henry reached up, his whole arm trembling, and curled his fingers about the bar. He began to pull himself upright.

  Elizabeth slapped her hands against her cheeks in astonishment. “Isn’t that wonderful?” the nurse said.

  Yes, but it’s only an arm, she told herself later as she sat beside his bed knitting a sweater which she planned to send to her sister for the youngest baby. It’s only an arm. When she considered how far he was from walking and even then they weren’t sure about his right side. “Henry,” she said loudly several moments later as he lay panting from exertion. His hearing has not been affected, the doctor had told her, there was no need to yell, but she couldn’t help it. It seemed that because he couldn’t talk above a whisper, he couldn’t hear either. “I have been wanting to talk to you about the farm.” Her metal needles clicked out a frantic pace. “I was thinking, the way prices are that now would be a good time to sell.”

  He didn’t respond. She set the knitting aside and went over to his bed. He stared at the ceiling. She sat down on the edge of the bed. Spittle ran from one corner of his drooping mouth. She snatched up a tissue, began to dab at it. “Think of it,” she said gently. “Everything considered, we should get rid of the land.”

  He pulled away. “No,” he said, and then louder, “I forbid you to do that.” He began to thrash his head from side to side on the pillow. She held his cheeks between her hands, felt the faint flutter of his muscles as he tried to free himself. She felt ashamed, unworthy.

  “Henry, please, be still.” His head was fragile, as fragile as an ancient porcelain cup that would shatter if you flicked it hard with your knuckle.

  “It’s all right,” she said. “We don’t need to talk about it yet.” She had dreamt of him one night, that she carried him out and away from the hospital. I’ll care for you, she’d said. I’ll look after you, make you well. And here she was, upsetting him. He grew still. She patted him lightly on the cheek and felt that peculiar ache rise in her chest. The farm, it wasn’t hers to sell. She took up her knitting once again. “The way your exercises are going,” she said, “you will be up and around the yard by spring.”

  He blinked rapidly. “Phone Hank P.,” he said harshly. “Tell him I’ll lease the land. One year only.”

  Elizabeth dropped a stitch, squinted and raced to pick it up before the whole sweater unravelled. “I’ll tell him,” she said.

  “He’s not being very realistic,” John said. “Expecting anyone would even want to lease the land for one year. Especially a guy like Hank P.”

  Especially Hank P., Elizabeth thought. He would be the one to do it. “You’re a fine one to talk about being realistic,” she said and laughed. When he was small he would butt his head against her stomach, his crib, the walls, in order to make things happen. In the early grades in school, teachers said that he threw himself on the floor and banged his head when he didn’t make one hundred per cent on a test.

  “But he’s not thinking,” John said, choosing to ignore her gentle teasing.

  Elizabeth shushed him. “He’s your father.” And John was his son. There were indelible marks other than his short stocky frame, his bullishness. John was deeply religious like Henry, in an unbending, fierce way that made her feel defensive and inadequate. And yet, father and son had never worked well together.

  “You have to realize why your father wants to hang on. What has he got?” A bed, a chair, a window in a shoebox of a room.

  John got up from the kitchen table and put his arm around her shoulders. “And what about you?” he asked. “Shouldn’t we be thinking about you as well?” If she stood up, she would be a foot taller than he. All his caresses came when she was sitting. She leaned back in the chair and let her head rest against his chest. For the first time since Henry had fallen in the snow, she felt like weeping. He kneaded her shoulders, demonstrative in a way she’d taught him. The way Henry might have been if someone had shown him how. She’d kept house for Henry a full year without realizing that he cared for her. Not until he fired the hired man for making jokes about her size.

  “This has been hard on you, we know,” John said. “Sharon and I don’t know how you’ve managed to keep everything up.”

  “It’s all right,” she said. “I’m all right.” She wanted to tell him about her desire. About the greenhouse. When she worked in the greenhouse, the sun’s light diffused through the sloping glass roof and its steady warmth on her broad shoulders made her feel secure. The smell of the young moist plants in their flats of peat moss filled her with energy and she walked faster, moved more quickly. She enjoyed reading through all the seed catalogues and meeting the people who came to buy bedding plants.

  “It’s not all right,” John said. “Sharon and I have been thinking — even if Father doesn’t get well, you should go away for a while. Take that trip to Niagara Falls.”

  “Oh no,” she said. “Not without Father.” If she went to the falls alone, she might never come back. She’d be swept away by the thundering water. She’d be a speck going over the brink, tumbling in the mist, never stopping. With no one to hold her back, she would lean over the railing with all those other people in yellow rubber raincoats, she would lean just so far and be gone.

  “I shouldn’t be thinking about trips,” Elizabeth said, “but what I’ll do if worse comes to worse. And I’ve been thinking, if something happens to your father, I would like to sell the farm and live in town.”

  He smiled a quick anxious smile, sat down beside her and took her hands in his. “Great,” he said. “I’m glad to hear you say that. Sharon and I were hoping that’s what you’d want. We’ve made plans and I wanted to talk to you about them. It makes it easier that you want to live in town.”

  She thought he would say they were going to start a family and wanted her close by.

  “We’ve decided to open another dealership. A bigger one. This time, in Morden.”

  She hid her disappointment. “Why go to Morden? I thought — isn’t business good here?”

  She saw the look of annoyance pass across his face. “I’d keep the business in Reinfeld as well,” he said. “And open another one in Morden. Because business is good. No
w’s the time to do it.”

  “Father always said you spend too much money.” She pulled her hands free and began to clear away the dishes.

  She expected an outburst, but John got up and began to help her. He scraped food from plates. Sharon had taken a day to go shopping in the city and he’d come for supper.

  “We’re positive we should do this,” John said quietly as he set dishes down into the sink. “We’ve prayed long and hard and we’re sure that this is what God wants us to do, too.”

  “Well then, that’s good. Do it.” She was conscious of her voice sounding tight and strained.

  He cleared his throat noisily and spit phlegm into the garbage can, just as Henry used to do. “I’ll need money to do it,” he said. “I’ve got too much tied up in machinery right now to go to the bank.”

  “How much money?” Henry had five thousand dollars in their savings account. She had a little from working in the greenhouse.