The Brushstroke Legacy (14 page)

“What did you say?” Erika called from outside.

“Nothing.” Psycho aunt was right, one who sees people who aren’t there and talks to herself.
Pretty soon I’ll be talking to the people who aren’t there.
Her fingers cramped from holding the soap pad and scrubbing so hard. She flexed her hand and stripped off the rubber gloves, eying the stovepipe all the while. More rust. Would they be able to get the pipe down and clean it, or would it need to be replaced?

“Here.” Erika handed her the spiral notebook. She studied the stove. “I never thought it could look that good again.”

“I was hoping. Sure a lot of scrubbing to do.” Ragni rotated her shoulders and stretched her neck. “Inside the oven is going to be a real bear.”

“You really want to cook on it?”

“I do. Just think, if we get this place cleaned and fixed up some, we could come here to visit again. Perhaps your mother would like to come too. Maybe bring Grammy.”

“Oh, right. Mom leave her precious hospital and come clear out here? Get real.”

Whoa, a bit of resentment there.
“Is that part of the reason you are so angry all the time?”

But Erika ignored her and boosted herself up on the counter under the clean cabinet. She stood up as much as she could, took paper and pencil from a lower shelf, and began drawing.

“What are you doing?”

“Copying her painting.”

“Why?”

Erika shrugged. “Just seemed like a good idea.” She squinted and erased a section. “Maybe Grammy would like something with this design on it. For Christmas.”

“How come you never draw anymore?” Ragni asked.

Another one of those shrugs that irritated the life out of Ragni. Ragni shook her head and took her scrub bucket outside to dump the water under the rosebush. A bud on one of the straggly branches showed a hint of yellow. “How you managed to live out here this long with no one tending you, I’ll never know.” She dropped to her knees and pulled out a hunk of grass from around the main cane, wishing she had a trowel.

Green grass fought for life in the weeds, several of which wore blossoms of their own. Somewhere she’d read that a weed was just a flower in the wrong place. Too bad she hadn’t found that book on native plants of North Dakota. Perhaps some of the shops in Medora would carry something like that, or maybe there was even a bookstore. Surely they didn’t need to go to Dickinson for everything.

You’re like a butterfly flitting from blossom to blossom. Get back inside so you get something done
—
-finished.
She groaned as she pushed to her feet. Somehow the hours she spent at a computer and in never-ending
meetings hadn’t prepared her for all this manual labor.
Funny, I thought I’d be worried about my job
—
what is happening there and who’s been messing with the final ad layout
—
but this is the first time it’s even entered my mind. What kind of hinges will it take to fix the gate? Or can it be wired up until I have time to install new hinges? The gate seems far more important than events at the office. Strange doesn’t begin to describe it
.

She took herself by the scruff of the neck, like a mother cat carrying her kittens, and forced herself back into the kitchen.

Erika jumped down to the floor at the same time.

“Can I see?” Ragni asked.

“Sure.” Erika handed her the papers. While Ragni nodded, Erika pointed to the lettering. “I wrote in the colors so I don’t forget, but maybe next time we go to town, we could get some paints.”

“I guess.” Ragni nodded, still studying the drawing.

“What’s wrong with it?” Belligerence colored the tone, and Ragni glanced up to catch Erika’s frown and narrowed eyes.

“Nothing, why? Its very good.”

“Oh, I thought—”

“You thought what?”

One of those shrugs and an offhand grimace. “Well, you didn’t say anything, and it’s nothing, really.”

Ragni stared from the drawing to the girl. It was more than nothing. Something had happened somewhere that… “Remember when we used to draw and paint? How come you don’t anymore?”

The kitchen filled with a silence so abrupt that she could hear the whispering cottonwood leaves outside.

“Nothing.” That familiar mask of indifference, disdain, and boredom dropped over Erika’s face as she snatched the paper back.

Something happened. I wonder what and when
—
and most important, who and why. Did Susan say something? Not intentionally
—
she’d never hurt her daughter intentionally. But then, Susan can be pretty over-bearing when she gets on a roll. A friend? teacher? How to get Erika talking about it? That’s a monumental task in its own right.

Look who’s talking.
This, the voice of her inner critic, the one who attacked so gleefully—all for her own good, of course.
You don’t paint in oils, acrylics, or watercolors. You don’t draw, not even for pleasure on the computer any longer. Why, you hardly even doodle. No wonder you’re tight as a banjo string, so tight that even the spa didn’t do you a whole lot of good. Why worry about Erika? Look at yourself.

If there were any way to muzzle and cage the vicious creature inside her, she’d do it gladly.

“Ragni, come look.” Erika’s voice now cracked with excitement.

Ragni turned back to see her grinning like a little kid, the way she used to before goth. “There’s more, a lot more.” She pointed to the top two shelves. “And this is even prettier.”

Ragni brought the stepladder over. “You should have been using this. Its safer.”

“I didn’t think of it. Look.”

Ragni climbed up, feeling more stable on the ladder, and studied the painting. Nilda had used more colors this time, and while one shelf was the rosemaling like the former, the upper shelf was devoted to local plants. Were these the ones she’d had in her yard? The yellow climbing rose, sunflowers, bluebells, yellow daisies, and a couple Ragni didn’t recognize.
I have to find a bookstore. We need not only a book about birds but one about plants and trees.

“Will you copy these too?” Ragni asked.

“If you want. What if there are other places in the house where she painted?”

“Like where?”

“I don’t know. Remember Paul—er, Mr. Heidelborg said he knew of a friend of hers? What if she has some of the GGM’s paintings?”

“The GGM?”

“Well, I have to call her something.”

Ragni rolled her bottom lip between her teeth and tapped Erika on the nose. “Good one, kiddo.”

Erika grinned back. “You always used to call me that.”

“You’d think my mother would have some of the paintings if Ragnilda ever painted on canvas, or…”

“Otherwise, what happened to them?”

Ragni climbed down from the ladder and stared around the kitchen. They hadn’t checked the bottom cabinets yet. Some of the walls had been wallpapered. Surely no one would have wallpapered over Nilda’s paintings.

The sound of a truck stopping on the road in front of the cabin drew them both outside to see Paul stepping out and settling his straw hat on his head. Another man in a baseball cap climbed down from the passenger side.

“Mornin’, Ragni, Erika. Herb here joined me for breakfast at the Cowboy Cafe and said he could spare a few minutes. Herb Benton, meet Ragni Clauson and her niece, Erika. They’re members of the Peterson clan. You remember Einer.”

“Of course, he and my dad used to be duck-hunting buddies. Welcome to Medora. Where you from?” He smiled at each of them.

“Chicago,” Ragni replied.

Herb lived with a round face that smiled easily and showed the creases of that propensity. A faded blue T-shirt with a Benton’s Roofing logo plus the company’s phone number covered a slightly slipping chest. “Thought I’d take a look at your roof.”

“Oh, you mean now?” Ragni said.

“Good a time as any.”

“W-well thanks. I-I’m not used to people showing up so quickly.”

“Hey, when Paul here twists your arm, you kinda go along with him. ’Specially since he’s about a foot taller and a few years younger. You don’t want to get on his bad side.” He frowned up at his friend, but his dancing eyes said he was teasing.

“You want the ladder? It’s in the house.”

“Nah, I can give you a good estimate from the ground. You want it patched or a new roof—which is what I would recommend.”

“Why don’t you give me an estimate both ways, and I’ll talk it over with my mother. She’s the legal owner.” They followed the men around the house. Herb made notes as he went, rolling a measuring wheel in front of them.

“Have you seen any water damage in the house?”

“Some sagging in the back bedroom.”

“I’ll check inside then. They usually didn’t insulate these old places. Is there an entrance to the crawl space? Low as this is, can’t rightly even call it an attic.”

Ragni shrugged. “Sorry, I never looked.”
And if there’s a critter big enough to dig a burrow under the house, what might live in the attic?

They stopped at the west end of the house, and Herb pointed to the broken slats in the ventilator. “Most likely bats got in there. You heard anything up in the attic?”

Ragni looked at Erika, and they both shook their heads. “But then we’ve not been in the house at night.”

“Didn’t see any come out?”

“Never sat at this end and watched.” Bats. Ragni kept a shudder inside. Bats and snakes: no matter how many times she’d heard how good they were for the environment, she still didn’t want any kind of acquaintance with them. Knowing they were around was bad enough, but to see or hear them? Not daring to look at her niece, she kept a smile on her face—at least she hoped it was a smile.

After going through the house, Herb glanced at his notes. “I’ll go ahead then and work up a couple of different quotes. You’ll have to decide if you want shingles, or shakes—which due to the fire danger, we really don’t recommend. Or you could go with lightweight concrete or aluminum—the kind you see on Paul’s place. Then you have to choose the color. We have natural which is silver-like, red, blue, or green.”

“Once we decide, do you have any idea when you might be able to do it?”

He squinted his eyes, obviously thinking of his calendar. “Not until after the fifth. One of my guys is going on vacation. Dumb thing to do; you work when the weather allows, but you can’t tell the young folks that.”

But we’ll be going home by then.
Ragni decided not to complicate things at the moment. “When can you get me the estimate?” “Tomorrow?”

“Good. We’ll be at the Bunkhouse Motel tonight. Would first thing in the morning be a possibility?”

“I’ll meet you at the Cowboy. Eight all right?”

“That’s the Cowboy Cafe, right?”

Both men nodded.

Ragni heard Erika groan. “That’ll be fine.”

“You got time to come play with Sparky?” Paul asked Erika, glancing at Ragni. “I can give you a ride over.”

At the pleading look on Erika’s face, Ragni smiled and nodded. “Go play.”

“I’ll work twice as hard when I get back, I promise.” Erika nearly danced in place.

“What about you?” Paul’s smile looked friendlier than a general-purpose-good-for-anyone smile.

“I’ll stay here and work on my stove.”
Horses aren’t my real love like they are yours. Or at least they aren’t anymore.
Weren’t all young girls in love with horses and cowboys? And from the look on Erika’s face, she was falling for both.

Nilda never dreamed she’d be homesick, especially not for a place that wasn’t even her home. She’d just worked there. Be that as it may, the places where she worked were the only homes she knew.

And they were a world away. What in the world had she been thinking to come clear across the country in response to an advertisement paid for by a man about whom she knew next to nothing? Except he needed a cook and housekeeper. “Needed” scarcely covered the reality.

But he bought a milk cow because she mentioned her frail little daughter.

No matter how dirty the house, or how fierce he appeared, he must have a caring heart beating beneath that shirt that covered a chest broad enough to block a doorway, a shirt that needed a washboard as badly as the house needed a scrub brush. So how to handle the man, to tell him, “Thank you for the cow and please put on a clean shirt in the morning so I can wash your others”? What if he didn’t have a clean shirt? What if that was the only shirt he owned?

She lay in bed a few more moments, listening to Eloise breathe. Soft, gentle puffs of air, not the stentorian efforts that echoed across a
room when her lungs couldn’t pull in enough air to keep her lips from turning blue. While she’d started the trip weak and pale, she’d already begun to improve even in the short amount of time they’d been at the house.

Thank You, heavenly Father. Now please make this move work. I need to be wise. Your Word promises wisdom to those who ask, and I am pleading. There is so much for me to learn. Thank You for a safe journey, for our first day here. May You be glorified. Amen.
She lay a moment more, savoring the silence, then forced her aching body out of bed. Surely their arriving on a Sunday had been a good sign, even though they’d not gone to church.

Today Mr. Peterson would go to the store, so her list of supplies needed to be ready. But how long would it be before he went again? She hesitated to ask but knew she must. She heard the men getting up in the room next to her, coughing, and something thumping on the floor. The outside door yelped at being swung open.

Nilda hurried into her clothes, unbraided her hair, brushed it, then braided it again and wrapped the braid around her head like a crown, tucking and pinning the ends under. She pulled her apron on over her head, tied the ties in a bow, and slipped her shoes on. “Sleep little one,” she whispered and left the room.

“Mornin’, ma’am.” Hank, Joseph’s hired hand whom Nilda had met the day before, set a pail of fresh water up in the sink. “I am to teach you to milk this morning. The cow is ready.”

“I must start the stove first. How long does it take to milk a cow?”

“Depends on how fast you learn.”

“You milk in the dark?”

“Light is coming.”

Nilda glanced over her shoulder to the door to her bedroom. Would Eloise sleep until she got back?

“Perhaps fifteen or twenty minutes. The barn isn’t that far away.”

“All right.” She brushed away the ashes that she’d used to bank the coals in the stove, blew on them until they were red, and carved slivers off the pitchy wood kept on a corner of the woodbox. Smoke curled up, so she made sure the dampers were wide open to draw well. A bright flame flickered and called for more wood. Wood was far easier to start than coal, but a kerosene stove was the easiest of all. She’d cooked on one for the last few years.

After laying on smaller sticks, she added two pieces of split log and set the lids back in place. Dusting off her hands, she turned to Hank to find him nodding his approval.

“You do that right well.” He turned and led the way out to the shed-roofed building where the cow stood in a stall, her head caught between two boards.

She mooed a welcome and switched her tail.

“You got to watch out for that tail,” Hank warned her. “She gets to twitching and sure as shootin’ you’ll get slapped in the face. A wet and dirty cow tail is a real wake-up call.” He patted the cow’s rump with one hand and set a three-legged stool down beside the animal. “See that square bin over there?” He pointed to a wooden box with a cover. “That’s the grain bin. Fill the scoop inside about half full, then pour it in that box right beside her head. Eating takes her mind off the milking.”

Nilda lifted the hinged lid, seeing the scoop in the dim light that came through the cracks in the board walls and the open doors. She
filled the scoop, poured some of the grain out, and walked over to dump it in the cows trough.

“She likes to be petted. Soon’s she gets to know you, since you’re the one to feed her, she’ll be your friend.” He sat on the stool and set the bucket in front of him. “Now watch what I do and then we’ll switch places.”

“Do you have to sit so close to the cow?” Nilda swallowed a lump in her throat that could only be called fear. While she’d read about cows, she’d never been this close to one. She was used to milk coming in a bottle, delivered on the doorstep every other morning and kept cool in the icebox.

“You take two teats—you can do the two closest to her front legs or the two closest to you, don’t matter. I like the two front and then the two back. Pull and squeeze, one hand at a time.” Two streams of white milk pinged into the bucket. “Loose your grip and keep the rhythm going.” He smiled over his shoulder. “Makes a song all its own, hear it?”

Nilda heard nothing but the thudding of her heart. If Mr. Peterson had told her she had to milk a cow, she most likely would not have come. She clamped her lower lip between her teeth.
Uff da. I can do all things…
That verse seemed to be needed a whole lot more out here than back east.

With a smooth motion, Hank stood with one hand holding the bucket. “Now it’s your turn.”

Nilda sat down on the stool, facing the cow. Near as she could see, she was in a perfect place to get kicked clear across the barn. She swallowed and chewed her upper lip. Hank handed her the bucket.

“Put it between your knees like I did, only you’ll have to scoot closer. I like to plant my forehead in her flank, lets me know if she is feeling restless.”

She followed his instructions and took hold of the two front teats. They felt warm and soft but when she squeezed and pulled, nothing came out. She looked over her shoulder to the man standing there.

“Try it again. One hand at a time. Pull and squeeze. You’ll get it.”

Please Lord, did You ever have to milk a cow?
She did as he said, and this time a bit of liquid dribbled out.

“Nice and easy. You ain’t jerkin, it out of her but pretendin’ you’re a calf so she can let down her milk. Think of sucking.”
Must he talk so frankly? Is this something else I need to get used to?

She tried again, this time doing the squeeze and pull in one motion. Milk came from both teats. A few more times and the milk rang into the bucket. As soon as the bottom of the pail was covered, the milk made a different sound.

The cow shifted her feet, and Nilda grabbed for the bucket.

“She’s fine, you keep milking. When nothing more comes from those front two, move to the back.”

After a false start or two and a few good spurts, Nilda’s forearms began to hurt, then cramp. She ignored the pain and kept on until not even a drop came out and the bucket was half full.

“Now you want to strip her out. Pinch your fingers together, start at the top, and go to the bottom.”

Nilda did as told and a few more squirts came out, then nothing. “Am I finished?”

“Ja, you are. You did good. Now keep your hand on the bucket
as you stand up, pulling it out with you. Good. Hang up the stool on that peg on the wall and put the bucket of milk on the top of the grain bin so you can let her outside.” He waited for her to put the bucket down and join him beside the cow.

“Does she have a name?”

“Not that I know of.” He stroked the cow’s shoulder and grabbed the nail to pull up a piece of wood that locked the stanchion board in place. When the board fell to the side, the cow backed up and made her slow and easy way out the door to the pasture.

“Well, I never.”

“Now you take the milk up to the house, run it through the strainer, and you’re done.”

“What do we do with all this milk?”

“My ma always let it set so the cream could rise, skimmed off the cream for butter, had us all drink plenty of milk, including the buttermilk, and dumped the rest to the pigs and chickens.”

“Do we have pigs and chickens?”

“We have chickens. A pig will come soon, I’d bet. Joseph don’t let nothin’ go to waste.”

Together they walked back up to the house, dawn now peeking over the hills to the east and setting the trailing clouds on fire.

“Let me see about Eloise, and then if you would show me how to strain the milk?” Nilda asked tentatively.

“Ja, that is good.”

She set the bucket on the counter and hurried across the room, only to find Eloise sleeping like a kitten in the sunshine.

Back in the kitchen, she watched Hank stretch a dishtowel over a
pot and tie it down with a string. “You tie this with a bow so you can untie it easy and not waste the string, see?”

“Ja. Then pour the milk through?”

“Nice and slow like, so it don’t slop over the edges. Got to have time to drain through.” Again he demonstrated, then handed her the pail. “Pour good and slow.” He chuckled as she hardly let it drip. “Faster than that. You’ll get the hang of it.”

This time some slopped over the edges. “Sorry.” Nilda felt as inept as a child.
Ha, even a child could learn more quickly than me. Probably even Eloise.
She ordered her hands to quit shaking. With the end of the bucket, bits of grass and sand were caught in the dish cloth.
“Ishta.
That is not good.”

Hank snorted and shook his head. “Many people don’t bother with straining, but my mother taught me well.” He glanced around the kitchen. “Not that you’d know all she taught me from the way things are around here. Two bachelors like us spend all our days outside, and the inside is just for cooking and sleeping. You made a good meal last night.”

“Ja, and if I don’t get on it, breakfast will be dinner. Mange takk, you are a good teacher.”

“Bang on that iron rod hanging outside the door when you are ready.”

She watched as he limped out the door. He moved mighty fast for a man with one leg shorter than the other. His smile carved crevices in leathery skin, worn so from many years in the sun. While he hadn’t shown her where the chickens lived, she’d heard them clucking behind the barn. Since her mother always kept a few hens, she knew how to feed them and gather the eggs. At least he wouldn’t have to
teach her that.
The advertisement should have read, “Housekeeper and cook with farm experience.”

Most of the families around her folks’ home in the outskirts of Brooklyn kept a few chickens, sometimes even a goat for the milk. Big gardens fed large families and provided plenty of work to keep children out of mischief in the long, lazy summers. Until she’d gone to work as a maid when she turned fourteen.

While the ground oats cooked, she found a slab of bacon, wiped off the blue mold, and cut off enough slices for breakfast. With the leftover biscuits from the night before, the bacon and eggs and mush should be enough. Hunting through the shelves, opening every tin and jar, she realized they were missing more necessities than she’d thought. No yeast, no sourdough starter, no potatoes to make potato-water starter. So no bread would be baked today. That was fine because she could spend her time scrubbing the old part of the house from ceiling to floor, including the log walls. And if that wasn’t enough, all the bedding and clothes needed to be washed too. She mixed a cup of flour with several teaspoons of sugar and a cup of milk, beating it well to draw in as much air—and thus natural yeast—as possible. After pouring the mix into a small crock, she covered it with a cloth and set it on the counter to ferment into sourdough.

When the bacon was crisp, she set it on a plate in the warming oven where the biscuits were nearly warm enough to taste fresh. She stepped outside, then took up the smaller iron bar tied to the bracket that held the larger one and rang it vigorously. After several loud peals, she returned to the kitchen to finish setting the table while the frying pan kept warm on the cooler part of the stove. Mush first, then bacon and eggs.