“I’m afraid the matter is of some urgency. Ernie has already acquired the fruit.”
“It won’t keep,” Gloria murmured.
“I’m not sure he realized just how ripe it was before he brought it home.”
Gloria wiped her hands on her apron for no reason.
“Rose wants to learn as well,” Minerva said. “I’m sure there is no one else she would want to learn from as much as you.”
Gloria sighed. “You have to be serious about learning.”
“Eight bushels of ripe fruit is quite serious, I would think.”
“And Rose will come with you?”
Minerva nodded. “She’s quite enthusiastic.”
“Tomorrow morning, then.”
CHAPTER 33
Gloria sucked in her stomach and squeezed past Lillian’s chair for the fourth time that morning. Of all the kitchen chairs Lillian could have chosen to occupy, she positioned herself between Gloria and the cupboard with the canning pots.
“Water bath canning?” Lillian’s high-pitched inquiry sounded to Gloria like a bird’s chirp.
“It’s just fruit.” Gloria squatted to pull a canner from the lowest shelf. “No point in confusing her with how to operate a pressure cooker.”
“I suppose that’s a lesson for another day.”
I hope not. Gloria had promised to help Minerva can her fruit, but that would be the end of it. Rose was the more likely candidate to learn well. If Rose caught on quickly, Gloria might yet redeem her day. And where was Polly? Despite her tendency to test the seals before they fully cooled, she was a competent canner. She could at least sit at the table and peel fruit. Gloria took a second canner from the cupboard and inspected the jar lifter. It was as old as Yost but still serviceable, and if they kept both canners going, they might finish the task before Gloria lost her patience.
Minerva could send Gloria spiraling toward vexation within minutes. Rose, though, made Gloria slow down and enjoy her presence. Perhaps they would average to a tolerable stasis. “For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.” With a prayer for strength to control her tongue, Gloria gathered the funnels, spoons, knives, and towels.
“The school has more students in it than ever,” Lillian said. “Did you hear?”
Gloria started the burners heating. She hadn’t thought to ask Minerva what condition the jars were in. Minerva wouldn’t have known anyway. They would have to inspect and wash each one.
“And they are paying the teacher less every year,” Lillian said. “I believe the school district is aiming to close the smaller schools and consolidate.”
“How do you know all this?” Gloria nudged a canning pot toward Lillian. She was capable of pumping the well, and at least the task would get her out of the inconvenient chair.
“Nancy heard it,” Lillian said. “Some parents were talking.”
“Would you fill the pot for me, please?” Gloria lined up another beside the first. Parents should be mindful of listening ears. “Both of them, if you don’t mind.”
“Of course. You know I always want to be helpful.”
Only pressed lips contained the scoff that welled up in Gloria.
When Lillian went out the back door, Gloria moved two chairs from near the stove to the far side of the room to make a clear path for working. From the front room came the quarter-hour announcement of the grandfather clock Gloria’s father had made as a wedding gift. She should have known better than to suppose Minerva would turn up at the agreed-upon time. They could have been washing fruit for the last thirty minutes. Even when they were girls in school, Minerva had a ready supply of excuses for being late.
And what steamed Gloria most was that the teachers accepted them.
Finally the truck rumbled down the lane. Gloria went outside to meet it and wave Minerva around to the back. She was not the particular housekeeper Minerva was, but dragging the dirt of eight bushels of fruit and a hundred jars through the house was only asking for extra cleaning labor later. Gloria braced for Minerva’s excuse—without an apology—for the tardiness.
Rose jumped out from behind the steering wheel.
“I’m sorry! Please forgive me. It’s my fault we’re late.”
Minerva emerged from the passenger side with more reluctance.
“I found an injured bird this morning,” Rose said. “I couldn’t just leave it there. I think it can heal and fly again.”
Such a tender girl.
Gloria expelled her breath, feeling ashamed. She shouldn’t take her feelings for Minerva out on Rose.
She shouldn’t even have those feelings. Not after forty years.
Minerva wiped the side of her hand down the front of her apron. Gloria should have warned her to bring more than one. Berry juice and fruit syrup seeped through with every movement. The stains might never come out.
Especially without a washing machine with proper agitation.
“We’ll replace the sugar,” Rose said, “won’t we, Mother?”
“We have plenty,” Gloria said.
“I should have thought about making the syrup.” Rose had chattered steadily all morning. She was grasping the steps of canning more readily than Minerva. On the one hand, Minerva was pleased to see her enjoying herself. On the other, she wished her daughter did not find pleasure in such a tedious task. Surely this was a phase, something Rose would lose interest in. She would marry a man of business, not a farmer, if Minerva had anything to say about it. Rose could putter in a vegetable garden or plant a couple of apple trees outside her own home, but there would be no reason to raise her own food in any quantity.
Gloria blathered with instructions. Heat the water until hot but not boiling. Keep the jars and seals hot until time to fill them. Wipe the rim of the jar clean with a damp towel. Tighten the lids until snug. Keep the jars above the water until the whole rack is ready to be lowered. Don’t let the jars touch each other. Add enough hot water to cover the jars by at least two inches. Start timing only after the water comes to a full boil.
For Rose’s sake, Minerva did her best to look interested. When she took dozens of fruit jars home, Ernie would smile and help her stack them. Suffering through the day at Gloria’s would be worth it. But Rose was paying attention. If Ernie wanted Minerva to can again next year, Rose would know how to do it.
The kitchen was hot far past the point of allowable delicate perspiration. The room was not without order. The far end of the long table was dedicated to arranging clean fruit for chopping. Polly was stationed there next to Lillian, though Lillian did little chopping. For the most part, she read aloud from the Budget or offered advice no one had asked for. How did Gloria stand having her in the house all these years?
The splotches on Minerva’s apron testified to the sufficiency of her participation. Ernie would be able to see with his own eyes that she had done what he asked, and Minerva would not dispel his enthusiasm with her true feelings about the day.
As Minerva gave in to her aching feet and sank into a chair, Rose turned and looked over her shoulder at her mother. Minerva doubted her daughter realized the size of the spot an accidental squirt of raspberry juice had left. Rose’s apron was worse than Minerva’s.
But Rose’s face shone. She had stood before the stove most of the morning, and perspiration glimmered along her hairline, but the sheen in her complexion was not due to heat. Her lips turned up under a flush of pleasure as her eyes met Minerva’s.
“I’m glad we’re doing this together,” Rose said.
The moment was worth whatever price the day had asked of Minerva.
It was a good thing Minerva brought Rose with her, because it was clear to Gloria that Minerva couldn’t follow simple instructions. Don’t let the jars touch in the bath was not a difficult concept, but with every bath Minerva loaded, Gloria had separated the jars herself.
And Minerva worked slowly. If she kept house at this pace, it was a wonder she ever got a meal on the table. She seemed to
think she was supposed to protect her apron, rather than let the apron protect her dress.
Nevertheless, the piles of fruit steadily diminished. At midday, Polly drove a basket of sandwiches out to the family members working in the field, and the crew in the kitchen ate while waiting for two baths of jars to seal. They had plenty of fruit to supplement their sandwiches, and Gloria uncovered half a chocolate cake.
Her lunch only partially eaten, Minerva stood up and stepped over to the counter where lines of jars were cooling.
“How do we know when they’re ready?” Minerva crooked a raised finger.
“Don’t touch them!” Gloria pushed her chair back with such force it nearly toppled.
But her warning was too late. From across the room, Gloria watched Minerva rapidly press her index finger into the lids of four quarts. All four popped up.
“You just broke the seals,” Gloria said. “Now you’ll have to eat all four jars soon instead of enjoying fruit in the winter.” What was the point of canned fruit in the fall, when fresh fruit was falling off the tress?
“I simply asked a question,” Minerva snapped.
“Pay attention, Minerva,” Gloria said. “The seals have to cool completely or you’ve just wasted your effort.” How many times had she already said this?
“It’s Minerva’s first time,” Lillian said. “We all make mistakes.”
Gloria glared.
“Rose and I are just learning,” Minerva said.
Gloria clamped her mouth closed. Rose was not the one who didn’t fill the jars full enough or who put them too close together in the bath. She wasn’t the one who lacked the patience to let the jars cool. Rose was the one who was paying attention.
“This was Ernie’s idea,” Minerva snarled. “I should have tried to make him understand the idea lacked merit.”
“Mother!” Warning shot through Rose’s tone. “We are guests, and Mrs. Grabill has been very generous with her time.”
Minerva huffed and swung around. Three jars crashed to the floor.
Rose’s face fell.
Gloria gritted her teeth. If Minerva was going to break jars, she should at least have broken the jars whose seals she had already ruined. Now seven jars—an entire bath—were wasted.
“I’ll clean it up.” Rose sprang from her chair.
Gloria snatched the Budget from the table and threw newspaper down on the mess to protect against shards of glass. Then she yanked her apron off, slung it across the back of a chair, and marched across the porch and down the steps into the yard.
CHAPTER 34
Polly was the first to wake on Tuesday, even before the sisters whose first task of the morning was the early milking, and knew immediately that drowsing a few more minutes would be a vain effort. Once her brain woke, even behind closed eyelids a guise of rest was futile. She rolled over and reached under the bed for her crutches. Her sisters would just have to pretend they didn’t hear her clomping across the bare wood floor, but she would not disturb them now with the cumbersome process of trying to dress without leaning on something. A nightdress would be sufficient for thumping down the stairs to the kitchen. Everyone would be glad to smell coffee brewing when they woke, and she could manage that much.
Descending the stairs involved a series of small hops. Polly was impressed by her own efforts to minimize the noise. In the kitchen, sun would stream through the window in a few minutes, and the milky gray of morning shadows would fade into the new day. Polly chose to do without a lamp and trust the systematic arrangement of the kitchen. The coffee canister was always in the same place with a scoop jabbed into the brown granules. Nancy was faithful about her evening chore of making sure there was enough water on hand to get the family through breakfast. Matches to light the stove had never been stored anywhere except on the shelf above it.
Polly bent slightly to trail her fingers along the cupboard doors that had been spattered with berries and peaches yesterday. She had returned from delivering lunch to the field to find Rose on her knees picking through bits of glass and mopping up fruit with a rag. Lillian was in a tizzy, prattling about how Polly’s mother had thoughtlessly thrown down the latest issue of the Budget to sop up the mess.
Minerva was slamming around a canning rack as if she knew what she was doing, and neither Lillian nor Rose offered an account of what happened until much later. Surprisingly, Minerva did know what she was doing. She cooked another batch of syrup for canning peaches and kept the jars and lids hot while they awaited fruit. When Gloria returned more than an hour later, she said nothing but only checked the heat under the pots and added some hot water before pouring syrup into a set of seven clean jars. Cooling on the counter were the jars Minerva had done on her own, and as far as Polly could see they were perfect.
At the end of the afternoon, Rose carried bushel basket after bushel basket of filled jars out to the Swain truck, and Minerva scrubbed down the counters. The cupboards were wiped clean and the floor mopped. Everything was put right, the sweet aroma of cooked fruit the only evidence of the day’s endeavor.
But Gloria and Minerva had not spoken another word all day, and Rose’s enthusiasm dimmed under the somber weight of silence. As soon as the family finished supper and evening devotions, Gloria withdrew to her bedroom, leaving Polly and her sisters to shrug wide-eyed at their mother’s mood.
Polly sat in the chair nearest the stove with a hand wrapped around an empty mug, listening to the perking coffee. The room had surged from clouded slate into glossy amber, a pledge of a crystal day. One rooster crowed, then another. Sufficient light permeated to shift Polly’s thoughts to what she might do to get breakfast under way.
Her head turned toward the sound of shuffling feet, and her mother came around the corner.
“Kaffi is just about ready,” Polly said.
“Thank you.” Gloria took a mug from the cabinet. “I didn’t hear you get up.”
“I tried not to wake anyone.” Her mother touched Polly’s shoulder and leaned over the coffeepot to inspect. Polly held up her mug to be filled.
They sat for a few minutes, sipping.
“Mamm,” Polly said softly.
“I know. I made a mess of things yesterday.”
“Lillian said Minerva broke seals and knocked over the jars,” Polly said.
“I don’t mean that. Rose was having a lovely day, and I spoiled it because I couldn’t keep from pointing out what her mother did wrong.”
Polly swallowed more coffee.
“I’ve been falling into her traps since the first time she made fun of my kapp when we were six years old.”
“Traps? What do you mean?”
“You saw how she was in the afternoon. She didn’t make a single mistake the rest of the day. Minerva knows her way around a kitchen. She heard every word I said in the morning, but she didn’t really want to be here in the first place so she was just being difficult.”
“Then it seems to me she is the one who spoiled Rose’s day.”
“She can’t help her old habit of baiting me.” Gloria reached for the coffeepot and topped off her mug. “But I’d like to think I’m wise enough to see it coming and get out of the way. She could have taken home the jars with the bad seals and put them in the icebox. She’s feeding six people. It’s not as if they would have spoiled. My own pride does me in. Hochmut.”
Polly could think of few people humbler and more steadfast than her mother—perhaps no one.
“Minerva tries my patience.” Gloria sighed. “But I was wrong, and now I’ll have to apologize. I’ll go right after breakfast.”
Marlin had been placid in his morning devotion on gentleness and self-control. Gloria hadn’t told him what happened with Minerva, but they had been married long enough that he didn’t need an accounting of events to discern when she waffled about what she must do.
And as much as Marlin enjoyed a genial relationship with Ernie, he was well aware of how easily Gloria could lose herself when Minerva was around.
She had already confessed her wrongdoing to Polly, and her restless night had confessed it to her husband. All that was left was to confess to Minerva.
It was like being in school the years Miss Thurman taught at the one-room schoolhouse and made squabbling students apologize. The teacher made such an event of an apology that most students learned self-control in behavior as a method of self-protection on the playground. They didn’t want to go through the rigmarole of Miss Thurman’s style of apology.
Minerva and Gloria were two students who failed to reach that plateau, and they were eleven years old at the time. Perhaps if Gloria had learned that lesson thirty-five years ago, she would not now be trudging to the Swain farm. She could have taken a buggy. Certainly it would have been faster. But Gloria needed the time to pray. Another ten or twenty miles of prayer would have helped even more, but the two-mile journey between neighboring farms would have to suffice.
As she drew near to the Swain house, Gloria slowed her steps not out of reticence—a cleansing apology would allow her to continue her day with a clean heart—but because a delivery truck was parked in front of the house. Minerva stood on the porch shaking her head and pointing toward the truck. A man in dark trousers with his white shirtsleeves rolled up wavered between the vehicle and the porch, two boxes balanced in his arms. Bits of their conversation wafted toward Gloria.
Scheduled delivery.
Changed my mind.
Forms to sign.
Full refund.
The man returned to his truck, stacked the boxes in the back, and rolled past Gloria on his way back to the road. Gloria looked toward the porch. Minerva’s eyes locked her gaze.
“Is everything all right?” Gloria asked.
“Of course.” Minerva made no move to come down off the porch. Nor did she invite Gloria up. “The company made a mistake. They really ought to do a better job of record keeping. I made it clear on the telephone that I did not require the items after all.”
Gloria nodded, though she doubted the explanation was that simple. Marlin had seen enough of Ernie during the last few weeks to know the Swains’ finances were choking them, but Minerva would never admit that.
Hope in the Land Page 23
