They Called Her Mrs. Doc.

by Janette Oke

  “I just can’t bear it any longer,” she cried almost every day. “I just can’t.”

  Cassie braced herself for a long winter. Somehow she must endure until spring.

  To all appearances things remained the same. Each Sunday morning she still taught the children of Jesus’ love and God’s goodness, then dutifully, even with some pleasure, played for the congregation. On the first Thursday of the month, she met with the Mission Circle at the Rays’ and stitched little garments for overseas babies or quilts for needy families, but inwardly her heart was crying out for the winter to end quickly so spring might release her from this prairie prison.

  And Samuel had no idea.

  Cassie found more to keep her busy with Christmas approaching. She helped bake for the food baskets to be sent to poor families in the city with the Rev. and Mrs. Ray, who would spend their holiday with family in Calgary. She sewed simple garments for a family who had lost their home in a fire. She volunteered for the Christmas program committee and rehearsed with the children every day after school. But none of her frantic activity eased the pain in her heart.

  Christmas came and went and she felt first anguish, then relief. She had always loved Christmas. Christmas had meant home and parties and plays and “occasions.” There was none of that for her this year. She had feared she would never make it through Christmas in the town of Jaret—Christmas in her own lonely little house. Then it was over—her first Christmas away from home. Surely a bit of her pain would also subside. Besides, now they were on the down side of the long winter. Now she could begin to count the days until spring—and home.

  But in March, Cassie discovered she was expecting their first child. The excitement was tempered with disappointment. It would not be wise to travel come spring. She would need to wait until the baby had been safely delivered. But the baby was not due until the first week of October. By the time she could travel they would be heading into a new winter. Would Samuel agree then to her and the new baby traveling the roads to Calgary to catch the train to Montreal?

  Chapter Twelve

  Beginnings

  The weather was quite favorable on the first Thursday of April as Cassie picked her way through the spring mud to the home of Mrs. Ray. She was looking forward to the afternoon. The ladies of the small group were no longer just names and faces, and though she didn’t feel that she had much in common with any of them, at least they were company.

  The usual group lined the small parlor, sewing in their laps and needles in their hands. But as Cassie let her eyes scan the room, and greeted familiar neighbors, she noted that a new face had joined the crowd. Something about that face drew her. It wasn’t just that the young woman seemed to be about her age. And it wasn’t just that she noticed almost instantly that the woman was expecting. There was something else in the face that seemed to pull at Cassie.

  As the meeting began, Cassie found herself lifting her eyes to catch glimpses of the woman. Where had she come from and would she be staying? But Mrs. Ray was soon to answer both questions.

  “Ladies,” the pastor’s wife said, “we are most happy to welcome a new member of the Sewing Circle today. Mrs. Foigt grew up in Winnipeg. She and her husband have purchased the town drugstore and will be joining our little congregation. We are so happy to have them here.

  “Mrs. Foigt has some interesting experiences that perhaps she can share with us sometime, for they have lived in the North before coming here. Perhaps at one of our meetings we can have her tell us a little of life near the Arctic.”

  Cassie could not keep her eyes off the face of the young woman. What was it about her?

  Mrs. Clement’s voice interrupted Cassie’s thoughts. “What’s wrong with now? We can listen and sew at the same time,” she said bluntly.

  “Well, it seems rather short notice,” responded Mrs. Ray with a little chuckle. “It may be that Mrs. Foigt would prefer a bit of time to sort of get acquainted and—” She stopped and looked inquiringly at the newcomer.

  “I wouldn’t mind,” said the young woman softly. “I—I haven’t prepared anything, but if you’d just ask questions, I’d be glad to answer them.”

  “Thank you,” Mrs. Ray replied sincerely. “Perhaps you could begin by telling us where you were and why you were there.”

  The young woman stood to her feet. She seemed a bit timid, but there was a serenity about her that put everyone at ease.

  That’s it! thought Cassie. She seems so—so totally—calm. At peace. But the young woman was speaking.

  “I went North because my husband went North,” she said and smiled. “Actually, my husband had a dream of one day owning his own drugstore—but by the time he paid for his education, he had little money to make a purchase. A friend visited and told us that if a man had a few good years in the North, he could make a lot of money trapping and selling furs. I didn’t like the idea of trapping. I don’t think my husband did either—but he did want the store and he didn’t know of another way to make enough money to purchase one.

  “So we talked about it and finally decided that it was what we should do. We moved up there shortly after we were married three years ago. We didn’t make lots of money—but we did make enough to come back and put a down payment on the little drugstore here in this town.”

  She hesitated as though awaiting her first question. It came quickly.

  “What was it like?”

  She smiled then. A soft, gentle smile. “It was cold and white and barren,” she replied. “I thought I would never warm up. Everything one did had to be done enshrouded in furs. Even the cabin was cold, though we kept the fire burning at all times.”

  “Were ya by yerself or in a town?”

  “We were in a village. Mostly made up of native people.”

  “Were they—did you visit back and forth?”

  “There wasn’t a lot of visiting. Most of one’s time in the North is spent keeping a fire going and looking after one’s needs. In the beginning I didn’t know anybody. Most of the people couldn’t speak English and I couldn’t speak the native language, so it was hard at first to really make friends. We’d smile and nod when we met—but that was about all.”

  Silence. Each of the eleven women in the room seemed to be considering the situation.

  “Weren’t there any whites?” asked a frail elderly woman tucked away in a corner of the room.

  “A few other trappers lived there, but only one of them had a white wife and she was quite old and not well. We did have a Mountie, but he was single and was usually on the trail. I didn’t get to know him well, though my husband did. He liked him.”

  “What was the village like?”

  “There was one store—a trading post. You couldn’t find much there but you could get essentials. They carried more traps and knives than they did grocery items.” She smiled again as though she found that amusing. Cassie cringed at the thought.

  “The village was scattered little shacks, I guess,” she said with a careless shrug.

  “Wasn’t that—sorta hard?” asked Mrs. Trent, her eyes wide.

  She must feel as I do, Cassie was thinking. I can’t think of anything more horrid than living in an old shack with everyone around me speaking a different language—and in constant winter.

  But Mrs. Foigt was continuing. “It was. At first, I—I guess I thought I’d never be able to stand it for one year—let alone three or four. We didn’t know how many years it might take. But then God began to work in my heart. I knew He had promised, ‘I will be with thee whithersoever thou goest,’ and I knew that must also include the North. I had told my husband I would support him in what he was planning to do, and I decided that if I was going to do that and not become ill from tension, or bitter from resentment, then I had to work on my attitude.

  “Well, I did try to work on it. The harder I tried to accept things, the angrier I became inside and the more I hated the North. I finally decided I could either let my anger and bitterness make me—and Morris—totally
miserable for three or four years—or I could go to God for the help I needed. I knew I couldn’t do it by myself. I had to learn to give the whole thing over to Him. When I learned to be totally honest and open with God, He was able to give me the help I asked Him for. The years in the North turned out to be good years.

  “Oh, I don’t say they were easy years—but they were growing years—and they were good years for Morris and me. We learned to love each other even more, and we both learned that the same—the same commitment we made to God and to each other to get us through those difficult times also can see us through whatever life brings to us. We know that just because we are back home, to a lovely little town, with all the fine things of life and a church and new friends and a nice little house where we can keep warm even in the winter—that doesn’t mean that things will always go easy for us. Difficult things can take one by surprise wherever one lives.”

  She seemed so sure of her words. Cassie was having a hard time keeping up with her own thoughts. This young woman was describing their town, their simple little back-of-the-world prairie town as “lovely,” “with fine things.” At first Cassie felt a surge of pity that the girl knew so little about real life. Real living. Then just as quickly she felt shame. Was she justified in feeling as she did? Certainly this prairie town was far from the culture and refinement of Montreal, but she was not suffering any real physical hardships.

  Then Mrs. Clement with her usual candor asked frankly, “This yer first baby?”

  The serene eyes shadowed for just a moment, then the same look of peace returned. “No,” she said softly. “We buried our first son in the North.”

  Cassie felt her whole being tremble.

  How can you? How can you? she wished to cry out. You stand there and—and say that just as though—just as though—

  But the woman was speaking again. “That was when I really learned to love my neighbors,” she said softly, and Cassie thought she saw tears glistening in her eyes. “When our baby was sick the native women made sure that I was never alone. Morris was out on the trapline, and there was no way to get word to him. We didn’t have medicine—but the women—they were with me—night and day. We tried some of the native remedies but nothing would work. But they didn’t leave me. They brought food, they tended my fire, they just sat silently beside me. Then I knew—I really knew that there was a God and that He loved me. That He cared about my loneliness and my sick baby. That He sent His ministering angels to care for me—way up in that frozen northland—and I knew I could trust Him.”

  “But yer baby died,” clicked Mrs. Clement in reminder.

  “Yes. Yes, he did. God took him home. It wasn’t what I would have wanted but—God did it so gently. And every woman in the village knew exactly what I was going through. There’s not a mother up there who hasn’t lost at least one child. If I had been here—in some town or city—I would never have received the love, the support, the understanding that I received from those who knew exactly how I was suffering. And they showed their love in a hundred different ways. You see, by the time I left I had a bit of their language—and many wonderful friends.”

  A tear slid unheeded down her cheek, but she lifted a smiling face and said in confident manner, “I have learned, firsthand, that God is great and God is good. I thank Him with all my heart for my years in the North—my years of learning to totally depend upon Him.”

  She smiled again and sat down quietly.

  The hands holding the needles had forgotten to sew. Cassie was vaguely aware that many of them reached for hankies instead. Noses blew. Bodies shifted in their chairs. Throats were cleared. But for Cassie there was still confusion. What did she mean? How could she have gone through what she had and stand before them smiling? I need to think about this, she told herself. I need plenty of time to sort it out before I understand it. Before I—accept or reject it.

  And Cassie was the first in the circle to turn her attention back to her sewing.

  Cassie did a great deal of thinking and mental sorting over the next few days. She still didn’t fully understand all that the new neighbor had tried to share, but she did come to some conclusions.

  First of all, she decided that the young woman knew God in a way she herself did not. Cassie had been faithful in church attendance. Her parents had seen to that. She had known the Bible stories better than any other child in the catechism classes. She had more prizes for memorization, perfect attendance and Bible knowledge than she knew what to do with—but she didn’t know God the way this Mrs. Foigt did.

  But neither could she really understand what God had to do with one’s acceptance of a situation. Her unhappiness was not because she felt that God had deserted her. After all, she was busily engaged in the local church. It seemed safe to assume that God was also there. No, she was unhappy because she didn’t care for this rough, unpolished way of life. She didn’t have her mother, she didn’t have Abigail. She didn’t have her own room with its chintz-covered window seat and carpeted floors. She didn’t like the West. But she did love Samuel. At least most of the time she was quite sure she still loved Samuel.

  Cassie continued to wrestle with her problem and then came to one conclusion. She would try to get to know young Mrs. Foigt better. Maybe by watching her closely, she would discover what it was about the woman that gave her such an aura of peace.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Friendship

  It was not difficult to become acquainted with Mrs. Foigt. The town was small, the atmosphere open and friendly, the town druggist and the town doctor worked closely together, and they saw the Foigts in church every Sunday. Besides this, Cassie felt drawn to the young woman and could sense from her response that it was mutual.

  And as an added measure for common ground, both young women were expecting a child.

  It wasn’t long until they were finding little excuses to pop over to each other’s houses and stay for a cup of tea and a chat.

  “How are you feeling?” Mrs. Foigt asked one morning when she noticed that the teacup sat before Cassie almost untouched.

  Cassie smiled but pushed the cup a bit farther from her.

  “Quite well. But some mornings—I just can’t even think of trying to swallow something.”

  “I know what you mean. I had so much morning sickness with our first baby. And all I had to eat was—” She stopped and screwed up her face as though the very thought made her feel ill now. “Wild meat and pan-fried breads. I didn’t enjoy the fare at the best of times, but then—” She shuddered and Cassie shuddered with her.

  “I don’t know how you ever stood it!” Cassie exclaimed. “I would never have been able to do it. I mean—the whole experience. Of being there in the cold with no one as a close friend and your husband always out on the trapline. I couldn’t have done it.”

  Mrs. Foigt smiled and toyed with her china cup. “It really wasn’t so bad—after I gave in,” she answered softly. “It was fighting my circumstances that gave me pain.”

  “But, Mrs. Foigt—” began Cassie.

  “Please. Please, can we be less formal? I would love it if you would call me Virginia.”

  Cassie nodded her red head. “I’d like that,” she responded. “And my name is—” She hesitated for a brief instance and then made a quick decision. It was time to do some growing up. “My name is Cassandra,” she went on.

  “Cassandra. What a pretty name.”

  “I thought the same of Virginia,” Cassandra returned, then went on. “I’ve really wanted to talk with you—well, very personally. I—I feel that you have—well, that you have something—a peace or something I don’t have. I know you’ve—well, had to—what would you say—reach out for God through your difficult experience. But—well, I guess what I really want to know is—how you did it. I mean—”

  But Virginia was smiling. She seemed to understand Cassandra’s questioning heart more than her halting words.

  “It didn’t happen instantly. I mean, the initial contact, the reach
ing out to God and knowing that He was there—that He was waiting and anxious to—to be God—that happened perhaps in—well, an experience of faith. But the rest—it was a case of growing and learning and committing as He showed me new things.” She hesitated just a moment. “And prayer—much prayer,” she added.

  “I—I pray,” Cassandra tried to explain. “I mean—I was taught to pray. But it seemed—it seems He doesn’t pay much attention to my prayers. Why does He answer yours—and not mine?”

  Cassandra let her gaze fall to the pattern of the tablecloth. She still wasn’t sure how to phrase her questions.

  “Do you know God?” asked Virginia gently.

  “I’ve been brought up in the church. I’ve always known there is a God. I—”

  “But do you know Him?” repeated Virginia, just as softly, but with emphasis.

  Cassandra nodded her head. “I—I think I do,” she answered as honestly as she knew how.

  “If you just think you do, you maybe don’t really know Him,” said Virginia, “just about Him.”

  Cassandra lifted her head and looked into the clear blue eyes before her. “I—I don’t think I understand,” she said, shaking her head. “I—I really don’t see a difference.”

  “Do you believe that the king of England exists?”

  “Why, yes. Of course. Everyone knows he does.”

  “You are sure that he exists, which of course he does. Do you know him?”

  Cassandra laughed a little laugh at Virginia’s game. “Of course not,” she said, “I’ve never had the privilege.”

  “That’s really too bad,” said Virginia with a grin. “I hear he has untold wealth that he could bestow if he had a mind to—wealth that will undoubtedly be left as a legacy to his family.”