Sweet Home Alaska

by Carole Estby Dagg

  “Hmmm,” he said, “that might explain it.” He munched popcorn as he headed toward the chairs.

  Terpsichore leaned over the table toward the retreating old-timer. “Explain what?” she asked. But the mysterious man was already too far away to hear.

  CHAPTER 30

  Gone with the Wind

  EVEN TIGGER SEEMED TO BE GETTING READY FOR AN Alaskan winter, putting on an extra layer of insulating fat, but then she surprised Terpsichore with two kittens. Cally named the orange one Willa, and Polly named the gray one Rogers.

  Later that week, as the wind shrieked through spruce trees and bare limbs of cottonwoods, Terpsichore huddled in her cot and pulled the blankets up over her ears, trying to muffle the sound. Moments later, Tigger led her two new kittens under Terpsichore’s blankets. Terpsichore wished she had ten more cats to keep her warm.

  The tent canvas whipped in the howling wind that threatened to fly them all away to Oz, like Dorothy and Toto. Outside, the washtub clanged and rattled across the plowed field. Wind thrust itself under the narrow space between the wood platform and canvas walls, and whipped Matthew’s drying diapers off the clothesline.

  At a crack like a gunshot, Matthew stood in his crib and howled.

  “What’s that?” Cally and Polly whimpered.

  “Probably a tree that couldn’t stand up to the wind,” Pop said.

  Terpsichore coughed and pulled the blankets over her head. She flinched each time a tree snapped. She didn’t think any trees were close enough to hit the tent and crush them, but she wasn’t sure.

  • • •

  The next morning the wind had quieted from a shrieking howl to a dull roar. Pop peeked out the screened window. “It might be Friday, but with so many trees down and blocking roads, I doubt there will be school today. I think I see the washtub by the edge of the woods,” he said. “I’ll untangle it from the shrubs and see if I can find Smoky and Clarabelle.”

  “They didn’t get blown away, did they?” Cally and Polly pulled over a chair to look out the screened window too, but didn’t see the animals.

  “A one-ton horse won’t get blown away,” Pop said. “Clarabelle and Smoky probably just took shelter in the woods.” He pulled on his jacket and tied his hat on with a scarf. “But I’ll check on Smoky and lead Clarabelle back to the shed for milking.”

  “Check on the chickens too, Pop!” Terpsichore said. She didn’t have to worry about where Tigger and her kittens were. They had never left her bed.

  All the rest of the Johnsons crowded up to the window as Pop leaned into the wind to fetch the washtub and whistle for Smoky and Clarabelle. The animals emerged from the shelter of the woods, where they had kept each other company during the night.

  “Uh-oh,” Terpsichore said. “The outhouse blew off its foundation and tumbled clear over to the fence between us and the Ellisons next door.”

  Mother sighed.

  The chicken coop still stood, but when Terpsichore went to collect eggs, there were none. Maybe terrified chickens didn’t lay.

  By the end of the day, Pop and Mr. Ellison from the neighboring farm had braved the wind to put the outhouse back on its moorings and replace shingles on Mr. Ellison’s shed.

  • • •

  Outside the general store on Saturday morning, everyone traded stories with their neighbors about the wind damage.

  “Our outhouse too!”

  “Our woodpile got tossed around like toothpicks!”

  “The henhouse roof kited right off to who knows where!”

  “My washing—nearly every stitch of clothing we own but what was on our backs.”

  Someone made a show of looking at the grain calendar on the wall inside the general store. “Just checking,” he said. “I thought maybe the wind had skipped us over a couple months and we had blown clear into January.” He put his nose within an inch of the calendar. “Nope! Still October.”

  “If this is October, what will January be like?”

  “If we don’t get our houses by the next big blow, you won’t find me here. I won’t have blown away—my family will have packed up and left on the next boat south.”

  • • •

  Terpsichore anxiously picked her way over felled tree branches and scattered garbage toward Pastor Bingle’s tent. There was a note safety-pinned to the Bingles’ tent flap: “No library service today.”

  Terpsichore knocked.

  Mrs. Bingle pulled aside the tent flap with one hand, still holding a broom in the other. “Hello, Miss Terpsichore.”

  “Did the storm hit your tent too?” Terpsichore asked.

  “It did. The wind blew seventy-five miles an hour, I hear. Thank goodness none of us was hurt, but everything smaller than a breadbox went flying. Your books and magazines I’d set out, all your filed date-due cards, everything was hurled around, including some of our glasses and dishes. There’s still broken glass in here or I’d invite you in.”

  Terpsichore peered into the tent. “Where are all the books now?”

  “Don’t worry, they’re safe,” Mrs. Bingle said. “Pastor Bingle thought that if the rest of the winter’s going to be like this, your books would be safer in the new school building instead of a tent, so he got the key to the school and put the books in the hall outside the principal’s office.”

  Terpsichore sped toward the school to see for herself that all the books were safe.

  Both doors to the school were locked, so she trudged back to the general store to rejoin her family.

  “No library today?” Mother asked.

  “Pastor Bingle moved all the books to the school after the wind storm hit their tent,” Terpsichore said. “And the school is locked, so I’ll have to wait until Monday to get all the books back in order.”

  • • •

  On Monday, Terpsichore packed her acquisitions log along with her homework. She wanted to take inventory to make sure every book was accounted for. The books were right where Mrs. Bingle said they would be, just outside the principal’s office.

  “Good morning, Terpsichore,” Miss Quimby, the principal, said. “Isn’t this a grand surprise? Pastor Bingle moved the little library from his tent to the school for safety. The teachers and I had just been talking about how we’d like to start a school library, and here we are.

  “Miss Fromer came in Saturday afternoon to look over the collection. She took classes in library science at the University of Washington, so she’ll be our librarian. She plans to train some of the eighth-graders to check books in and out during lunch hour. I understand you’ve been helping Pastor Bingle with the library, so I’m sure she would make an exception about using eighth-graders and let you participate in the training.”

  Terpsichore’s hand went to her pounding heart. “I already know how to shelve and check books in and out. And those books weren’t Pastor Bingle’s to give the school; they belong to the Palmer Library Action Committee, a group I started.”

  The principal flushed while Terpsichore continued.

  “Some of those books are my grandmother’s and she wants them back if we move back to Wisconsin next fall. And I wrote letters to the Red Cross and Girl Scouts to get donations.” Terpsichore dropped her satchel and dragged out her accessions log and opened it to the first page. “See? This list shows where each book came from. And it was the Action Committee that earned money for supplies and our first magazine subscriptions. Mendel collected bottles, Gloria had a hair salon, I washed diapers, and we sold popcorn. We did it all ourselves.”

  “I had assumed that Pastor Bingle had solicited donations . . .”

  “It’s not just grown-ups who can do things, you know.” Terpsichore clenched her hands so tightly her fingernails bit into her palms.

  “I appreciate your efforts, but it’s time for a professional to take over. Miss Fromer has had the proper training to run a libra
ry.”

  Terpsichore jutted her chin, that stubborn chin, according to Mr. Crawford. “Then I’ll take back all of Grandmother’s books, and the ones from my mother,” she said, daring the principal to say she couldn’t.

  Terpsichore pulled some of her books from the various boxes where they’d been packed higgledy-piggledy after the wind had scattered them. She put as many as would fit into her satchel.

  “I’ll be back for the rest,” she said.

  CHAPTER 31

  The Committee Meets

  EVERYONE ELSE WAS ALREADY SEATED WHEN TERPSICHORE edged through the door and dropped her overloaded satchel on the floor beside her desk.

  Thud! It was only books, but it sounded like a tree felled in the forest. Shock waves traveled the floor, shaking the rows of desks and making every set of eyes turn in her direction. She turned slowly to meet all those eyes. Terrible Teddy opened his mouth to make a rude comment, but one blast of her basilisk eyes made him clamp his mouth shut. Even Miss Zelinsky, who normally would have chided her for being late, just raised her eyebrows.

  She felt a splotchy blush spreading from her cheeks, down her neck, and advancing to her chest, over her heart. At roll call, instead of a chipper “Present!” she croaked “Here.” Miss Zelinsky was watching her too closely for her to be able to pass notes to Gloria and Mendel. She’d have to wait for first recess to gather the troops.

  Finally, the minute hand of the clock clicked from 10:29 to 10:30. Desktops clapped shut over schoolwork and students lined up to go outside. It took two eighth-grade boys to shoulder the doors open against the wind.

  Gloria’s yellow slicker whipped against her legs, and fierce wind cut through Terpsichore’s jacket. Gloria grabbed Terpsichore’s hand. “What is it?”

  “We have to get Mendel too,” Terpsichore said.

  The good thing about a friend is that she doesn’t need to wait for answers to questions before helping. Terpsichore and Gloria darted into a cluster of boys and pulled Mendel away from his new buddies, which surprisingly included Terrible Teddy. “Come on, Mendel, we need you,” Terpsichore said. “Emergency Library Action Committee meeting.”

  “What’s the emergency?” Mendel asked.

  “The school is taking over all our work!” Terpsichore said.

  Mendel jerked his arms away from the girls’ grasp. “Look,” he told them, “I already quit the library committee, okay? It was something to do during the summer, but now that school has started, I don’t have time.”

  Gloria linked arms with Terpsichore. “All right then. Be that way. We don’t care. We girls can take care of it ourselves.”

  “Gotta go,” Mendel said, and strode off to join his buddies.

  Terpsichore and Gloria huddled on the side of the school building. Terpsichore shouted over the howling wind. “After the storm blew our books all over his tent, Pastor Bingle moved everything we collected to the school, and now Miss Quimby wants to keep the books here permanently and put Miss Fromer in charge.”

  Gloria leaned toward Terpsichore’s ear. “Is that such a bad idea?” Gloria shouted. “If the books are here, kids could check them out whenever they’re at school instead of just on Saturday.” She pulled back to read Terpsichore’s expression. Terpsichore was not convinced by this argument. Gloria persisted. “It will be a lot easier for some kids. Don’t you want everyone to have books? I thought that was the idea of a library.”

  “But it’s ours,” Terpsichore said, “our library.” She realized she was still shouting, even now that the wind had abruptly stopped.

  Gloria finger-combed her hair back into place. “Look, we got what we wanted, a library. What does it matter where the books are or who runs the library now? I’m just as happy to have Miss Fromer do all the work.”

  • • •

  The next day, Terpsichore dumped nearly twenty dollars in dimes and nickels on Miss Quimby’s desk. She followed the money with the well-worn World Book brochure. “Here’s the money I earned selling popcorn to buy a set of encyclopedias. Since you’re taking over the library, you can figure out how to get the rest of the money.”

  She didn’t stay to see the look on the principal’s face.

  Terpsichore was glad she was alone in the tent after school. Cally and Polly must have been with Mother and Matthew somewhere. Her father was at work at the mill. She took out the box that had her date-due stamper and her inkpad, nibbed pen and india ink, mending tape and spine labels. She took out the date-due stamper and stamped the back of her hand. Then she stamped a row of dates on up her forearm. She stamped each page of her arithmetic homework.

  She looked up when Mother, Matthew, and the twins came home.

  “I just got back from the school,” Mother said as she set Matthew down. He toddled over to Terpsichore’s cot and grabbed the stamper. Terpsichore grabbed it back. “That’s mine,” she said. “It’s not a toy.”

  “Matty’s toy,” he said, trying to grab it back.

  Terpsichore held the stamper over her head.

  Her mother sat on the cot next to her. She looked at Terpsichore’s arm, with the row of dates marching up to her elbow, but did not comment on them. “Miss Quimby sent a message to me,” she said. “She said you threw money on her desk and were rather rude. That’s not the way you were brought up.”

  “It was nineteen dollars and seventy cents! She should have been happy to get it.”

  “It didn’t sound like you were happy to give it, though.”

  “Of course I wasn’t happy. I worked hard for that money and I worked hard to get a library started and now the grown-ups are taking it over, like kids don’t know how to do anything right by themselves.”

  “I think there’s room for you in the reorganized library, but you might have to apologize to Miss Quimby and show Miss Fromer that you are a responsible young woman and—”

  “Me apologize? They should apologize to me. They took everything over without even asking!”

  “From what I heard, that was a misunderstanding. Miss Quimby is new here and didn’t know about your library committee. When Pastor Bingle brought over the books, she assumed that the library was something he had started, and that he was turning the books over to the school where they’d be safe.”

  • • •

  The wind howled again that night and Terpsichore did not sleep well. On the way to school the next morning, she worked out what she would say. She knocked timidly on Miss Quimby’s door. “I’m sorry if you thought I was rude,” she said. “I was upset. Starting the library committee was the biggest thing I’d ever done, and when all the books got moved to the school it was like no one was giving us credit for all our work.”

  Miss Quimby stood and came around from the back of the desk to sit in a chair next to Terpsichore so they were eye to eye. “I apologize too. We didn’t know how the library got started. It must have been a shock to see all the books here. Miss Fromer and I have decided we will call the collection the Palmer Action Committee Library. And of course you don’t have to share your grandmother’s books, but I hope you will.”

  Terpsichore’s next stop was the eighth-grade classroom. She opened her satchel and put her shoebox of library supplies on Miss Fromer’s desk. “Um . . . here are the supplies the Demco Company sent.” She pulled down her sleeve, covering up the blue ink that hadn’t completely washed off that morning.

  “Thank you, Terpsichore,” Miss Fromer said. “It was very generous of you to donate the money you’d raised for the encyclopedia fund. Maybe you can help us come up with ideas on how to raise the rest. I always thought that a dictionary, an almanac, and a set of encyclopedias were the heart of a reference collection. It sounds like we think alike on that.”

  Terpsichore felt her jaw unclench.

  “Miss Quimby said you used to volunteer in your school and public libraries back in Wisconsin too. Could I convince you t
o pair with some of the eighth-grade volunteers to teach them during training?”

  Terpsichore suppressed a smile. A sixth-grader teaching eighth-graders?

  As Gloria would say, “Keen-o!”

  CHAPTER 32

  Sleeping in the Hayloft

  ONE MORNING IN LATE OCTOBER, TERPSICHORE WOKE TO eerie quiet. The roof of the tent sagged, and Tigger, Willa, and Rogers purred softly from under the covers when she stirred. She slid out of bed and tiptoed in wooly-stockinged feet to untie the tent flap and see what kind of morning they had that day. Eight inches of snow blanketed the field and weighted down the slender branches of the spruce and cottonwoods.

  Mother joined Terpsichore at the tent opening and, in a barefooted stomp, returned to the cot where Pop was still half asleep.

  “This is it, Mr. Johnson,” Mother said. “We get our house now or we’re moving back to Wisconsin!”

  Pop stood up and wrapped his scarf around his neck. “You’re right, Clio. We have to get out of this tent and into a house. I’m going to harness Smoky and pay a not-too-friendly call on Mr. Irwin in the administration office. I’ll stop by the LeClercs’ and the Petersons’ and some other neighbors and see if they will back me up.”

  “Can we go too, Pop?” Terpsichore asked.

  Pop looked at Cally and Polly, huddled under the blankets on their cots, and Matthew’s red, dripping nose, and Mother, standing with her hands on her hips.

  “Well?” Mother asked.

  “Maybe it would help our cause,” Pop said. “Bundle up.”

  • • •

  Mr. Irwin’s office tent also sagged with the weight of snow. Pop rapped on the tent support. Terpsichore heard Mr. Irwin’s chair scrape back from his desk as Pop, Mother, Cally and Polly, the Petersons, the LeClercs, and a few others crowded into the tent.

  Pop started off. “Your contract with the CCC that says they have to do all the building is ridiculous. If you want this colony to succeed, let us work with the CCC to build our own houses and barns.”