Ice

by Ulla-lena Lundberg

  And that’s the end of Eric Alexander Cain and his story, or so they think. But a month later there arrives a pretty blue airmail letter from the U.S. Embassy addressed to the Rev. Peter Kummel. When he opens the envelope, twenty-five dollars fall out. The pastor can see that the letter was written by a Mrs Inez Cain, the mother of Eric Alexander, but he has never studied English, just Finnish and German and a little French and Latin, plus Ancient Greek and Hebrew, and he has to ask his father for help with the translation. Papa is in his glory, and the translation comes back at once. The letter is well-written and expressive. Mrs Cain thanks Pastor Kummel for giving her son a Christian burial. It would give her comfort in her great grief if he could tell her something about the funeral and the grave itself. She is enclosing twenty-five dollars for its beautification, which she hopes he can use for that purpose.

  The pastor is ashamed. Dreadfully ashamed, for two reasons. First, because he did not himself write a short letter to tell her about her son’s funeral and the churchyard where he lies. And second, even more shameful, because he unconsciously assumed that the seaman came from a background where his people slaved on cotton plantations and could neither read nor write. How could he be so thoughtless, so prejudiced? What reason does this woman with the lovely handwriting and the friendly message have to believe that he will put her cash gift to proper use?

  Now the letter goes quickly back to father Leonard, who is given detailed instructions about what to write. 1) A warm thank you for her kind letter. 2) The deepest sympathy for her son’s tragic and untimely death. 3) A description of the funeral and burial. 4) An assurance that the pastor’s wife herself will see that flowers are planted on the grave the following spring, together with their thanks for the monetary contribution, which will be used for a cross with engraved nameplate. 5) A final word about Jesus’s promises, which conquer death.

  If he believes for a moment that Papa will follow his instructions, he is quickly disabused of his error. Petter has at least had the foresight to have the letter returned to him for his signature, which has kept his father from immediately mailing it off to America, beaming. What his father returns to him is a terribly long, tightly written letter. Even without knowing English, it is easy to see that Petter’s instructions have not been followed. Papa begins by writing four pages about Negro slavery, which he opposes. Then he writes three pages about his own difficult years as an immigrant in America. Next, he writes about the weather in this part of the world, which has given him rheumatism, destroyed his nerves, and brought the life of Mrs Cain’s son to an end. On the last page, when he has tired of writing, he has scraped together a few lines about the funeral, the plantings, and Christian hope.

  Papa! Why does it have to be this way? Every time Petter begins to develop slightly friendlier feelings towards him, it turns out to be misguided. How is a man to honour such a notoriously foolish father? Who rushes off half-cocked, who lacks balance and all sense of proportion? As usual, Petter is left feeling bitterly disappointed at the end of an unnecessary detour by way of a father who can’t even help him with a simple letter in English, a language he is so proud of knowing. There is no one else on the Örlands who can help him. A couple of older men have been in America as carpenters, but their English is spoken and practical, and he doesn’t want to embarrass them by giving them a task they won’t be able to handle. He himself is childishly unwilling to admit that he doesn’t know English, and he lets several weeks go by while he goes around feeling ashamed of himself for various reasons before he does what he should have done in the first place—writes an appropriate letter and sends it to his contact at the U.S. Embassy and asks him to translate it.

  By then he has much else to think about. Mona, whom he’s always considered to be healthier and to have a stronger constitution than he himself, has come down with rheumatoid arthritis and has been ordered to take medication, stay in bed, and, the worst part for her, have complete rest for four weeks. Again they have reason to be extremely grateful to Doctor Gyllen, who made the diagnosis, and to the local council, whose newly established homecare service makes it possible to get help with the milking and the two little girls.

  Doctor Gyllen frightens Mona into realizing that unless they can drive her illness into remission, she will wind up a cripple. Mona has seen cases in her own village that make her listen, and she now lies wrapped up in bed, as protected from draughts as it is possible to be in the draughty parsonage, with woollen arm warmers drawn up over her elbows and wool on top of a flannel nightgown covering her body. Her joints are swollen and painful at this acute stage of the illness, but total rest will help the body to fight it.

  Petter feels terrible guilt for having dragged his wife out to this icy lair, this abode of wind and weather, and possibly having destroyed her health for the rest of her life. Is it the cold that’s to blame? he wonders contritely.

  Not necessarily, Doctor Gyllen thinks. It is hard to explain why a particular disease affects only some of the people in a population living under identical circumstances. It seems to be the case that there is more than one reason why disease breaks out. She is only speculating here, but in the course of her quite comprehensive practice in Leningrad she noticed that when women Mona’s age came down with acute rheumatoid arthritis it often happened some time after a completed pregnancy. Almost as if the body’s adjustment made it more susceptible to this kind of illness.

  And, she adds, before he’s had time to ask, “A large percentage of this category regained full health under conditions I have prescribed for this patient.”

  This is of the greatest interest to Mona, because she has seen her rheumatoid arthritis as an indictment of her failure to wear enough warm clothes. In fact, she has dressed warmly, and the doctor’s words are a considerable comfort. She means to follow doctor’s orders to the letter even though complete inaction is going to make her crazy. She is not allowed to do handwork or even strain her wrists for any extended time by holding a book or a newspaper.

  Four weeks! It’s hard to imagine how she’ll be able to hold out for such a long time when there’s so much to do. They can’t hope to keep Sister Hanna for four weeks, and in any case she wants to take care of her cows and her children and her house herself—separate and churn butter, knit stockings, write letters, and go to the outhouse. Now she has to answer the call of nature in a potty chair in the bedroom, which others then have to carry out.

  She listens to the radio for as long as she can stand the static. As often as he can, Petter comes in and tells her what he’s busy with, and when the mail comes she can read the papers if she’s careful turning the pages. The pastor is busy as a bee, for, in addition to all the duties of his office, many of the practical chores fall to him as well. Mona was so efficient that they were hardly noticeable before, but now he’s got more than he can handle. Sister Hanna has her hands full too, and he tries to help her as much as he can—fetches wood and water, builds fires in the tile stoves, and often goes with her to the cow barn to help with the mucking out and the feeding. In the evenings, they lie in the dark and talk. These conversations are her greatest comfort and the bridge that leads from one day to the next. His voice, his hand holding hers, his thumb massaging the inside of her wrist, the hope in his words.

  Of course Sanna often sits on the edge of the bed or moves about the room and talks sensibly. She has started liking her little sister now that she knows her mother can’t devote herself to her. Sister Hanna places her at her mother’s breast when she’s hungry, but Mama can’t lift her or change her. It’s so cold on the floor that she mostly has to sit in her crib, where she would live like an animal in a cage if Sanna didn’t keep her company. As soon as she walks into the bedroom, Lillus gives a happy shout, and when she’s in the right mood she thinks everything Sanna comes up with is fun.

  Sanna also talks to Sister Hanna, who goes quietly about her work in the kitchen. When she has time, she comes and talks to the pastor’s wife. About her duties, about what s
he’s to do and how, about where some things can be found and where others may be hiding. But also about many other things, about terrible diseases that have struck people on the Örlands, whole clusters of children left motherless, a helpless father left alone with his entire brood, his animals in the cow barn and no way to deal with it all. The need for help is inexhaustible, and still it was overwhelmingly difficult to get the local council to pass the proposal to create a home aide. Sister Hanna looks sad and bitter at the memory, and Sanna listens. “It’s awful when the people who have our fate in their hands have no feeling for the troubles of their fellow creatures.”

  Mama and Sanna are all ears as Sister Hanna tells the story. Votes were taken again and again, and she names all those who voted no. She emphasizes that it was only when the organist became the new chairman that he managed to persuade his cohort to vote for the resolution and then cast the deciding vote himself. Mama and Sanna heave a sigh of relief and cheer, for the organist is their idol, and they can both bear witness to how badly Sister Hanna’s services are needed. The bedroom becomes a zone of warmth and mutual respect. Mona, who has always had difficulty accepting help, finds it a little easier when Sister Hanna tells her again and again how comfortable she is in the guest bedroom.

  If only no wife and mother becomes acutely ill and dies! For the moment, everything is working nicely at the parsonage, but how will it be in future? Was he selfish and thoughtless, Petter wonders, when he applied for the post of pastor on the Örlands? If Mona can’t stand the climate and the cold, draughty parsonage, that puts his decision in a whole new light. Is it fair of him to insist on staying on if doing so puts his beloved wife’s health at risk? When he was in Borgå, the bishop was very friendly and understanding and implied that a priest of Petter’s calibre could make an important contribution in a significantly larger parish. At the time, of course, he said that his calling was to the Örlands, but if that calling means that he must sacrifice his wife’s health, then it’s time to reconsider.

  He says, in the darkness of the bedroom. In just a couple of weeks, a good deal of Mona’s pain and swelling has abated, and she is in good spirits. “Oh, now don’t go rushing off again half-cocked,” she says. “Let’s wait and see how things look a month from now. Appointments won’t be announced until the spring, so we can wait. Doctor Gyllen said it wasn’t necessarily due to the cold. If I get well, I want to stay where you feel at home, it’s as simple as that. No point in wasting energy on a lot of unnecessary speculation!”

  “Don’t say that just for my sake,” he tells her.

  “For my sake too, you dimwit. You’ve become much nicer since we came here. And where else do you think I could have my own cows? Don’t forget I feel at home here too.”

  For even though the islanders are in many ways her rivals for Petter’s time, attention, and favour, there’s no denying that they have a great attraction for Mona as well. She hasn’t come to know as many of them as Petter has, but the ones she’s met she likes, and she is much more particular than he. She had thought she would have to spend much of her enforced confinement with the radio and Sanna’s chatter as her only company, but it turns out that many of those who have business on Church Isle come in to say hello. Without the least embarrassment, they sit down and talk for a while and it is as naturally as an eighteenth-century queen receiving visitors while lying in her bed. Then they have coffee in the warm parlour and discuss their errand with the pastor. Best of all, of course, is when the organist stops by, gallant and handsome, with a warming smile. “And how is the patient today? Just fine? And the young ladies?” He looks at Sanna, who stands on the threshold admiring him, and at Lillus in her crib.

  “Sit down for a moment if you’ve got time and tell me what’s going on out in the world,” says Mona. Insightful as he is, he talks about the conditions in his cow barn where he has five cows and various younger animals, a horse in his stable, and nine ewes and a ram in his sheepfold, always of interest to the pastor’s wife. Then he tells her of the latest schism in the local council about the allocation of funds to the school library in the east villages that is open a few hours a week. The opposition—short-sighted, narrow-minded, uncultured— cannot see that reading is an important educational benefit for the public good. Then about the winter communications, functioning relatively well this year although Anton has his work cut out for him. Finally, less willingly, and only when she asks, about Francine.

  Yes, the boy was born severely retarded. Doctor Gyllen said so and the hospital in Åbo has confirmed it. In addition, a congenital heart defect. Blue, due to poor oxygenation. Best, frankly, if he were to die. Poor child, poor Francine. Exhausted and unhappy, of course, thank heaven they have Mama in the house. What would they do without her? So the housework is getting done, but Francine is miserable. It’s a shame about their daughter. He’s trying to be both a mother and a father to her, which isn’t easy when he has to be away so much. Which reminds him that, however pleasant it is to sit and talk, he has to go find the priest and discuss the coming vestry meeting and then get home. So thanks, and see you again. Hope you’ll be feeling better soon.

  Yes, for however singular and beautiful the Örlands are in themselves, nevertheless the people are their main reason for wanting to stay. Mona doesn’t want to mention it for fear of tempting fate, but she feels that she’s getting well and wants desperately to get started on all the springtime work. It will be their third spring on the Örlands, and they’ve already accomplished much. Conditions in the cow barn are good, they’ve added to their farmland, their crops will be a joy to behold when the time comes, the fences are repaired, and they’ve put money aside towards a horse and a motorboat. It will take a catastrophe to get them to leave all this.

  Chapter Twenty

  WHEN THE PASTOR’S WIFE starts getting dressed for the installation of the new vicar, she finds she can no longer get her arms into the little black wool dress that witnessed Petter’s ordination. It’s not that she’s grown fat, just that hard work on the Örlands has developed her muscles and joints. Her girlhood is behind her, and she can only laugh. “Look there!” she says to Petter. “No seam to let out, and anyway I really don’t have time to let out seams.” She sounds surprisingly cheery, he notes, and the fact is that his wife is not a bit unwilling to revolt against the unwritten law that dictates black, black, black as the festival colour for women of the church. Black wool is not recommended for the pastor’s wife as she leaps like a doe among her many duties. Instead, she has no choice but to wear her new summer dress, recently arrived in an American package, which fits beautifully and has a pretty collar, bloused sleeves, and a wide skirt. It has a pretty pattern in blue and fuchsia and is cool as a dream compared with the black wool. The first time such a creation has appeared in the front pew at the installation of a vicar! Petter’s engagement necklace around her neck, her hair rolled and combed, cleared for action!

  “You’re so pretty today,” says the pastor, although he knows she’ll answer, “Oh, go on!” The vicar-to-be can still get into his cassock. Perhaps it has grown with him, since he has worn it every Sunday since his ordination. To be sure, it sits as tightly as a suit of armour, but the seams hold. He will simply have to see to it that he grows no more substantial than he is right now. It’s as warm as burning Gehenna on a day like this, but they have decided never to complain about the heat on the few warm days they are granted on these wind-tortured islands. And it is truly a good thing to have such fine weather on this day, when Church Isle will be covered with people all day long.

  What would they have done had it rained? After the service, they will serve coffee to at least four hundred people, and after the open-air programme of speeches and songs, the guests who have come a great distance will be served dinner—potatoes, fried pike with horseradish sauce and several square metres of lettuce that the pastor’s wife has raised in her kitchen garden, tender and delicious, which she’ll serve with a dressing of eggs and cream mixed with a little s
ugar, salt, and vinegar. The famous local breads—black and homemade white, her own butter, her milk, and her well-brewed small beer. For dessert, prune whip with whipped cream, an Åland speciality. Help in the kitchen, of course, but under her own watchful eye. Plates, coffee cups, bowls, and silverware borrowed in big baskets from the Martha Society and the youth centre. All this food and activity spreads out across the kitchen and the dining room, but the parlour is a protected zone. Here the visiting dignitaries are served a substantial breakfast of porridge, cheese sandwiches, and coffee or tea, to hold them through the long installation service.

  It’s like a royal visit. First the bishop, the bishop’s wife, and the assessor will arrive from the east on one of Åbo’s fast Coast Guard cutters. Many of the Örlanders have already arrived and stand on the bell-tower hill keeping a lookout. When the foaming prow of the boat is seen in the distance, a message is sent to the parsonage at once, and the vicar-to-be and his wife stroll down to the church dock to receive their visitors with a smile. Welcome, welcome! And thank you, thank you! The Coast Guard crewmen, like aides-de-camp, ready with discreet hands as the bishop—in his doctor’s hat, cassock, and bishop’s cross—steps ashore with his wife. Handshakes and great delight on all sides about the weather, about seeing one another again, about the Day and all it will mean for the life of the faith in the outer islands. “And it’s so beautiful here. So indescribably lovely!” The gentlemen walk slightly ahead, scrutinized by Apple and Goody, who then focus their attention on Mona, who does not stop and pat them but informs the bishop’s wife, “Yes, they’re ours, I tend them myself. Without cows of our own, we’d have a hard time feeding ourselves out here.”