Measure of Katie Calloway, The: A Novel

by Serena B. Miller

  It had made a quite satisfying clatter. She was delighted with her own ingenuity.

  “Is it time to get up?” Ned’s sleepy head emerged from beneath the covers.

  “Go back to sleep, little brother,” she said. “I’m getting such an early start I won’t be needing your help this morning.”

  Without argument, he snuggled back down beneath the covers.

  Once again she had slept in her clothes, but that would stop after today. Now that she knew she wouldn’t have to rush around in the morning, she would take the time to put on a proper nightgown at night and brush and braid her hair instead of keeping it in a tight bun.

  After putting a couple more logs into the stove, she splashed some water on her face, grabbed a shawl, and stepped out into the starry night. There was a sharper nip in the air than what had been there yesterday morning. If she wasn’t mistaken, there was even a scent of snow in the air.

  She let herself into the cook shanty and began lighting the lamps that would illuminate the work area. Then she lit the tinder in the wood box and set the teakettle on to heat. The potatoes she had boiled last night after supper had cooled to the point that she could peel them to fry. The ham she had sliced yesterday, she layered into a large, covered pan and slid into the oven to heat.

  Last of all, she set a vat of lard on the stove. This morning she would make doughnuts. This time she would taste the contents of the sugar jar to make certain it was sweet before dumping it into the batter.

  There was something peaceful about working alone in the silence of this rough kitchen. There was something strengthening in knowing she was capable of making her own living. Something about the familiarity of the preparations for the men’s breakfast that made her feel strong and capable.

  Deep in the recesses of her heart, she realized that she had made an important decision during that wild crying session in the cabin yesterday. She would never allow herself to be bullied again. From this moment forward, with the help of God, she would take control of her own life.

  With the butcher knife held loosely in her hand, she walked over to Jigger’s room. She quietly turned the knob, then she kicked the door so hard it banged against the wall.

  The light from the kitchen spilled into the room over her shoulder, illuminating the wild-eyed expression on Jigger’s face as he took in the fact that she was standing in his doorway with a sharp butcher knife in her hand. It took everything she had not to laugh when she saw the startled and fearful expression on his face.

  “Time to get up, old man,” she said with satisfaction. “We have work to do.”

  The doughnuts were perfect and plentiful. The fried potatoes crisp and golden. The ham was tender. The biscuits fluffy. The tea was strong and scalding hot. Katie surveyed her table with pride as the men shuffled through the door.

  Then she spotted Mose again.

  He seated himself next to Robert in the same place Jigger had assigned him. Ernie was sitting next to him. He wasn’t acting perturbed about being seated next to a black man—and she was grateful. Mose deserved the respect of the other men. More than any of them realized.

  Once again, she studied Robert’s face for some sign that Mose had told him about her, but all she got was a morning nod.

  “Pass the ’taters.”

  “More sorghum.”

  “Butter—down here.”

  “Gimme more of ’em doughnuts.”

  The sound of forks scraping plates, the occasional burp, and requests for food was all the noise allowed.

  Still, the enthusiasm with which the men ate was really something.

  The logger from Maine startled Katie when he broke the silence. “Best doughnuts I ever et in my life, ma’am.”

  “No talking!” Jigger smacked the man on the back of the head. The logger gave Katie a wink before grabbing another fistful of doughnuts.

  After the men had finished, she and Ned washed and dried the dishes and reset the table. When she went outside to dump the pan of dirty dishwater, it was still dark. Starlight and the dim glow of lantern light slanting out of the cook shanty windows illuminated her way to the edge of the camp.

  She threw the dishwater into the brush that surrounded the camp and heard a disturbing, rustling sound, as though someone or something was walking through the brush.

  “Who’s there?” she asked.

  It seemed unlikely that a shanty boy would be skulking about in the morning darkness, but it didn’t sound like the footsteps of an animal. The hair of her neck stood up, and she backed away, holding the dishpan like a shield in front of her.

  She had almost decided to turn tail and run into the kitchen when she caught a glimpse of a person emerging from the brush. She couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman, but whoever it was walked hunched over and had a pronounced limp. The only people she had ever seen move like that were old and feeble.

  What would an elderly person be doing walking through these woods in the dark?

  As the figure emerged from the shadows, she saw what appeared to be a woman dressed in rags. Her long hair hung in tangles, and her face—what Katie could see of it in the dim light—was so dirty she couldn’t begin to guess the woman’s age.

  As the woman held out her hand, cupped, in a gesture of supplication, her sleeve fell away, and Katie saw that her arm was as thin as a stick of kindling.

  “Who—who are you?” Katie backed away.

  The woman looked like she might be an Indian.

  It was cold outside. Katie didn’t know what else to do except open the door and allow her to enter. Maybe Jigger would know what to do with her.

  The woman, Katie saw as they came into the lamplight of the cook shanty, was slight of build and much younger than Katie had first thought. Her limp seemed to come from an injured foot, and she was hunched over a bundle of clothing.

  Ned’s eyes were as large as saucers as Katie seated the woman at the worktable, where the leftovers from the men’s breakfast lay. She pulled off the dishcloths with which she had covered the piles of food. The woman gasped, but she didn’t reach for the food. Instead, she first looked at Katie for permission.

  Katie grabbed a tin plate and filled it. Ned rushed to pour a cup of lukewarm tea.

  “Here,” Katie said. “Eat.”

  The woman hesitated, still clinging to her bundle of rags. Katie reached to take it from her, but the woman resisted. Then, with the saddest eyes Katie had ever seen, she relinquished it to her. She immediately snatched a piece of ham from her plate and began to eat—chewing and swallowing but never taking her eyes off the bundle Katie had lifted from her arms.

  Katie, unwilling to have the filthy rags in her clean kitchen, started to set the bundle in a far corner of the room but was startled by a weak mewling sound from within. She pulled a ragged corner away and saw the wizened face of a starving baby.

  “Dear God,” she breathed. “Tell me what to do.”

  With the mother watching every movement, she unwrapped the rags from the tiny, yellow infant—a little boy. What on earth was she going to feed him?

  Jigger appeared in the doorway of his room. “What in tarnation?”

  “They’re starving,” Katie said.

  “They?” Jigger stalked toward her and the baby. The mother jumped up from the table and threw her body between Katie and Jigger.

  “I ain’t gonna hurt your baby, woman.” He turned his palms up. “I just want to see it.”

  Reluctantly, the woman moved away. She stood, wary and nervous, while he peered at the infant Katie held in her arms.

  “Scrawny little thing, ain’t it?”

  “What can we feed him?” Katie asked. “We don’t have a cow.”

  “Don’t need a cow,” Jigger said. “Go get me a clean washrag, boy.”

  Ned ran to get one of the cotton squares with which they washed dishes.

  “Dip it in that pot of tea and wring it out good.”

  Katie watched as her brother did as instructed. The mother, i
n the meantime, was eating fried potatoes by the handful, standing, never taking her eyes off her baby.

  Ned brought the moistened cloth to Jigger, who scooped a small pile of sugar into the middle of it, and twisted it into a cone shape. Drops of sugary liquid appeared on the outside of the cloth.

  “Here,” he said, sticking the pointed end of it into the baby’s mouth.

  The infant began to suck, weakly. A tiny, birdlike claw of a hand closed around Jigger’s finger.

  “He can’t live on sugar water,” Katie said.

  “No, but it’ll buy him some time.” Jigger touched the tiny scrap of black hair on top of the baby’s head. “The mother might have some milk for him once she gets some food into her own gullet.”

  The mother, now wolfing down biscuits, seemed to relax a little about the fact that two strange adults were hovering over her child.

  A door slammed and Robert entered. “Katie,” he said. “I’m taking the men into the woods today. We’ll be cutting too far out to waste time coming back here for dinner. You’ll need to bring it out to . . .”

  He stopped in his tracks as he saw the tableau before him. The woman cowered against a wall, watching him wild-eyed. Katie saw that she was grasping a butter knife.

  “Looks like we got us a stray squaw and a starving baby,” Jigger explained. “Got any good milk cows handy?”

  Robert came closer. The mother tensed even more as he approached the infant. Katie could tell that if he made one wrong move, the mother would spring at him—butter knife and all.

  “May I look at your baby?” he asked in a soft voice. “I promise I won’t hurt it.” She stared at him a long moment, then she laid down the butter knife and returned to filling her stomach.

  Robert reached for the ragged bundle.

  Katie handed it over. “I—I don’t have much experience with babies.”

  The makeshift sugar teat dislodged from the baby’s lips, and he began his pitiful mewling again.

  “I do,” Robert said. “Where is the evaporated milk?”

  “I put it in a cupboard,” Jigger said. “Your fancy cook here hasn’t seen fit to use it.”

  “Evaporated milk?” Katie asked. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

  “Some guy named Borden invented it before the war,” Robert explained. “The Union soldiers had it. The Southern soldiers didn’t.”

  “Oh.” She hoped he didn’t realize what he had just said. Presumably, if she were from Ohio and the widow of a soldier, she should have known about this new thing.

  Jigger returned with a squat tin can in his hand.

  “Dilute it with water that’s been boiled,” Robert told him. “It needs to be thinned down so it won’t give the baby belly cramps.”

  “All we got is this tea water,” Jigger said.

  “That’ll do.”

  Robert took a spoonful of the diluted liquid Jigger brought and dribbled it into the corner of the baby’s mouth then he gave him the small sack of sugar to suck until the milk disappeared. He alternated the sugar and milk until the baby fell asleep.

  Katie realized she had been holding her breath and let it go in a long sigh. “Will he live?”

  “That depends.” He glanced at the mother. “I hope so.”

  His finger, feather light, grazed the baby’s cheek as he handed the bundle back to Katie. “I have a new crew heading out, I have to go.”

  “What will I do while you’re gone?” She glanced down at the baby, then back at him. “I don’t know how to do this.”

  “If the baby tolerates the milk and sugar, give him a little more every two hours. Let the mother eat whatever she wants.” He headed toward the door. Just before he got there, he stopped and turned around to face her. “As far as whether or not the baby survives—it might be a good idea to pray.”

  The door closed behind him.

  Katie and Jigger’s eyes met. She knew that hers were pleading.

  “Don’t look at me.” Jigger shrugged. “You’re the one that found ’em.”

  Robert went into the woods long enough to get four teams of men felling timber. Two axe men on either side of a giant pine tree would notch it in the direction they wanted it to fall, and then begin to swing their axes, first one, then the other in a syncopated rhythm. The steel blades cut into the trunk, spitting out white pine chips. Another two-man crew stood ready to chop off the limbs after the giant fell. Once they had the tree cleared of limbs, they would use a crosscut saw to cut it into sixteen-foot lengths. Little by little, they would chew their way through the forest.

  After getting the work started, he built a campfire and set up an iron tripod from which he hung a bucket of tea. The work the men were doing was hard and sweaty. It was customary for loggers to break when they needed to for a short rest and a cup of tea. Many used the break to refresh themselves with a new plug of tobacco as well. Tobacco was one of the few comforts and luxuries the men had out here. He had made certain there was a good supply in the camp store.

  Word had spread that he was hiring, and a few more men arrived. He had to make on-the-spot decisions about who to hire and who to turn away. The man’s nationality or background meant nothing to him, or any other camp boss. The only thing that mattered was if a man was skilled and dependable. A lazy shanty boy would get others killed.

  As the crew swung into full production, he headed back to make certain the noon meal would be arriving. He was worried that Katie might have become too involved with the Indian woman and that pitiful baby to fix dinner. If nothing else, he could feed the child again while Katie threw the meal together.

  Halfway there, he was surprised to come upon her pulling the camp’s dinner cart. Ned was pushing from behind. She stopped for a moment when she saw him, then took a tighter grip and continued on.

  “It won’t be time for the men to eat for another hour or so,” he said.

  “I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to get there,” she said, panting from the effort of pulling the wagon.

  “Let me help,” he said.

  “I won’t say no to that.” She allowed him to grasp the handle. He was amazed that she had been able to get it so far. He hadn’t thought, when he’d asked her to bring lunch to the men, how hard it would be for her. And all this time she had been dealing with that Indian woman and sick baby.

  Things were never uncomplicated—even in the woods.

  “How is the woman and her child?”

  “Moon Song and her baby were both sleeping when I left—on a pallet I made on the floor of the cabin.”

  “Moon Song?”

  “Henri found out. He’s that French Canadian you hired yesterday—the one who always wears that red sash and carries a fiddle around?”

  “I know Henri. He was late getting out to the woods this morning.”

  “That’s because he talked to her for a few minutes after breakfast. Moon Song is married to a French Canadian trapper, so she speaks a little French. They had a camp a few miles from here. He left and never came back. She was pretty far along in her pregnancy when that happened and ended up having that baby all by herself. When the food ran out, she started walking. When she saw the smoke from our stove, she came here.”

  “Does the baby have a name?”

  “Henri asked her that,” Katie said. “Moon Song said that the Menominee don’t name their babies until a counsel of elders choose a name for them.”

  “Wonder if her trapper husband left her on purpose.”

  “Who knows what a man might take it into his head to do!”

  To Robert’s ears, Katie sounded more bitter than the question or the situation warranted.

  “Moon Song looks like she might have vermin.”

  “Hopefully not any longer. I helped her take a bath and wash her hair while the bread was baking. The cut on her foot wasn’t as bad as I expected once I got the rags off. I think it’ll heal. She’s wearing one of the flannel nightgowns I bought in town. She seems to think it’s a dress.” />
  “Do you know where she came from?”

  “Way up northeast. Probably over into Wisconsin. Henri says she’s from something she calls the Crane clan.”

  “The baby is tolerating the food?”

  “Pretty well.” Katie sounded worried. “Moon Song is very weak.”

  “There isn’t a lot to eat in the woods in October.”

  “You won’t throw her out?” Her voice rose with concern.

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Some men would. She’s another mouth to feed.”

  “My lumber camp isn’t so destitute that I can’t feed a starving woman, Katie. Of course Moon Song can stay—at least until she can get on her feet and we can figure out how to get her to where she belongs.”

  Katie heaved a sigh of relief. “You are a good man, Robert Foster.”

  The camp was growing. And now she had inherited the care of the Indian woman and child.

  She knew had her father been alive, he would have advised her to pray. The idea of prayer was an attractive one—except that she seemed too exhausted to compose a coherent sentence right now. All she could do was send a silent, heartfelt plea for help to an invisible God.

  The dishes were done. The sourdough sponge set for more flapjacks in the morning, for which the men seemed to have insatiable appetites. Variety didn’t seem to be big in their priorities.

  She went out to the new privy and sat there in the dark, in quiet privacy, for a few blessed moments. Soon enough, she would have to face her cabin and the fact that an Indian girl with whom she couldn’t communicate and a sick baby were also taking up residence there.

  Still, it was a homey scene when she went inside. Ned sound asleep. Moon Song in the rocking chair before the fire—in Katie’s blue flannel nightgown—trying to nurse the baby. Katie could hear the suckling sounds. She peered over Moon Song’s shoulder, and unless she was mistaken, the baby’s cheeks were taking on a faintly pinkish hue.