Wild Heart on the Prairie (A Prairie Heritage, Book 2) (23 page)

They stood and Jan offered his hand. As Ernst took it, Jan
gently pulled him into a hug. Ernst, confused and a little embarrassed, did not
know how to respond. Jan embraced him, patted him firmly on the back, and let
him go.

Then he turned to Frank, extending his hand in the same
manner. But when he looked into Frank’s eyes, he saw tears standing in them.

“
Ja
, Frank, I know. I know,” was all Jan said as he enfolded
the young man in a hug. Frank clung to Jan, weeping silently.

Søren cast his eyes to the floor, a witness to something both
terrible and beautiful in its power.
Be a father to the fatherless
, his
pappa
had said.

I am so very blessed
, Søren suddenly realized.

~~**~~

Through the remainder of the summer and into harvest, Jan,
Søren, Ernst, and Frank met weekly. Mostly they read a chapter of Scripture and
then Jan invited questions and discussion.

Heidi was beside herself with delight knowing she would see
her grandsons on a weekly basis. Before long, Ernst and Frank were regulars at
their dinner table on Wednesday evenings.

The commitment to meet weekly—especially during the harvest—was
not an easy one, but it was a price Jan paid willingly. Søren, with no little
awe, watched as his father drew Ernst and Frank into the fiber of their family.

As fall came on and time was a little more relaxed, Jan
occasionally rode over to visit the two brothers by himself. Søren imagined he
understood the once or twice when Jan returned heavy-hearted and closemouthed.
Søren had witnessed Adolphe’s treatment of his stepsons and could only imagine
the painful things of which Ernst and Frank were unburdening their hearts to
his father . . . so Søren understood when Jan declined to discuss those visits.

Lord,
Søren prayed,
Please give my Pappa the ear
that can hear and the words that can heal!

The small church that met in Norvald’s barn was surprised to
see Ernst and Frank one frosty Sunday morning. Jan clapped both of them around
their shoulders and introduced them to members who had not attended the German
church.

Ivan sidled up to Søren. “What’s this I hear? You and Ernst
and Frank have Bible study with your father each week? Why have you not told
me?”

Søren shrugged and grinned. “If you ask my father nicely, he
may
let you come.”

The following Wednesday Ivan and another young Swedish man
showed up. The study and discussion was lively and warm, the best Søren could
recall.

“
Pappa
, this is a good thing, our study night. Can we
open it to others?” he asked before the gathering disbanded that evening.

Jan looked around. “I think it is up to us,
ja
? I
will only say that it should be for young men. This is the vision the Lord
spoke to me. So that we will grow up into men together,
ja
?”

The others nodded their heads in vigorous agreement.

“
Gud
. Then we are agreed.”

By the time winter was spent, the group of young men had
grown to nine. They had missed a few meetings when storms came through, but the
study and fellowship was growing in importance to them all.

“You have changed, Jan,” Amalie observed again one evening,
but she was smiling. Heidi was smiling, too.

Jan chuckled. “So. A
gud
change this time, eh?”

“Yes! Very good!” Amalie laughed, something that was
becoming more common.

“And you, too,
Søster
, eh?” Jan studied Amalie—the
woman who had been nearly conquered by the hardships of their first months on
the prairie and who had withstood the crushing loss of her husband. “You have
changed, too.”

Jan and Amalie smiled at each other, the bittersweet and
knowing smile of those who have fought a battle and survived together.

Another spring and summer passed. The Thoresens gathered in
good harvests and Jan was able to put money in the bank.

We have been in America ten years now
, he mused.
And
Elli, Kristen, and Karl have been gone four years
.

He was surprised that the pain that had accompanied such
thoughts for so long did not stab quite as deeply as it had in the past.

And then another busy year passed.

Thank you, Lord, for your faithfulness,
Jan prayed.
And
thank you for the contentment and joy I have found again!

The young men’s study had become a community affair. Some
evenings fifteen young men crowded into the Thoresen living room. Many of them
were bachelors who had struck out on their own and who had no family in the
community. On those nights the house resounded with good-natured ribbing, much
laughter, earnest conversation, and heartfelt prayer.

“Be a father to the fatherless,”
Jan remembered on
such a night.
Never, Lord, did I expect to render such a service to you! I
thank you!

Heidi surprised Jan and Amalie one evening by asking Søren
to help her say something to them. “You are both as dear to me as my own
children,” she began, and she clutched Jan’s hand in hers. “For what you have
done for my Dieter’s sons, I can never, never thank you.”

Amalie paled and looked to Jan.

“But?” he asked softly, his eyes watching Heidi’s face.

“
Ja
, but,” she whispered. “But I have been praying
and I feel the Lord has spoken to me. It is time I go back home. Neither one of
my grandsons has yet found a wife, and they need me.”

Amalie began weeping and shaking her head.

“
Nein, nein, Liebschen
,” Heidi murmured patting her
hand and shoulder. “There’s no need to cry! We will see each other at church
each week . . . and every Wednesday, if you will allow me to
come with Ernst and Frank when the men have their Bible study?”

“Of course!” Amalie cried. “Whenever you wish! You will
always be welcome here.”

As she sobbed into her apron, Jan looked a question at
Heidi.

“Jan, my dear son in the Lord, there will be no questions of
propriety when I leave,” Heidi answered through Søren. “The lives you and
Amalie live are open books to our community.”

“Still, I will stay in the barn, I think,” Jan answered. “I
am quite comfortable there and . . . and I wish to never give any room to
gossip or suspicion. Søren, perhaps you would like the downstairs bedroom when
Heidi leaves?”

Jan had no idea where that suggestion had come from, but
Søren grasped it eagerly. “I would! Thank you,
Pappa
.”

“
Ja
, maybe
you
will be bringing a wife home
someday soon, eh?” Heidi asked, a tease lighting her eyes.

Søren blushed scarlet at the suggestion, but he also
couldn’t hold back a grin.

“
Jan! Søren!
Please help!” Abigael’s desperate cries
reached across the creek and to the fields where Jan and Søren were working.
They dropped what they were doing and ran down the slope, splashed across the
creek, and up the other side. Abigael, seeing them coming, ran back toward
their tiny barn.

Then Jan and Søren could hear Henrik’s screams. Jan
shuddered. No man would shriek like that unless in unbearable pain. Søren looked
at his father, his face white with apprehension.

Just outside the small barn’s door they saw Henrik’s ox
thrashing on the ground. Henrik was pinned beneath the massive beast. The
traces of the plow were tangled about its feet; the sharp edge of the plowshare
was digging into the ox’s legs. The more the ox thrashed, the deeper the sharp
edge cut.

Henrik and Abigael’s boys had hold of their father’s arms
but could not budge him. Each time the ox thrashed, trying to free itself from
the plow, Henrik’s cries of pain pierced the air.

Jan moved around the deadly hooves until he was near the
ox’s head. The wild look in the animal’s eyes increased when it saw Jan. Jan,
speaking softly, reached out a hand and placed it on the ox’s head, careful of
the animal’s horns. He stared the animal in the eyes and rubbed its knobby
head.

While he tried to calm the ox, he reached around to the back
of his trousers and pulled a sheathed knife from his waistband. Søren knew
immediately his father needed him to cut the traces.

As the exhausted ox settled, Henrik’s screams died to
heartrending groans. Finally Søren had cut the traces and was able to pull the
plow away from the ox.

The ox struggled to his feet, eliciting fresh shrieks from
Henrik. Jan slipped a rope through the ox’s nose ring and led him to Henrik’s corral.

When Jan returned to his friend’s side, Abigael, desperate
and scared, was trying to assess Henrik’s injuries. The man lay panting in the
dirt, his face gray, his body motionless. A small dribble of blood hung on the
corner of his mouth.

Ah, Lord!
Jan prayed.
Help us in our need!

Abigael encouraged Henrik to climb to his feet, but Jan put
a hand on her arm. “
Nei
, Abigael.” Jan could tell that something inside
Henrik was broken. “Søren and I will carry him,
ja
?”

Henrik’s two boys, now thirteen and eleven years of age,
showed Jan their scrap lumber. Jan and Søren cobbled some boards together into
a makeshift stretcher. He and Søren lifted Henrik onto the stretcher with as
much care as they could. Jan took pains with Henrik’s left arm; he could tell
by the bulge under the skin that it was broken. They carried him into the one-room
house and laid him on the bed.

“Oh, Henrik!” Abigael moaned. “Where are you hurt?”

Henrik looked for and found Jan’s eyes. “Send her outside,”
he mouthed.

Jan nodded. “Abigael, please take the boys outside and calm
them. I will talk with Henrik,
ja
?”

Abigael looked at Jan and then at her husband. Jan knew that
she saw through his request. Her shoulders slumped, but without another word
she ushered her sons outside.

“Jan,” Henrik groaned through gritted teeth, “I am done
for.”

Jan shook his head vehemently. “
Nei
, it is not your
decision, friend. We will let God decide that,
ja
? Now tell me where it
hurts.”

“First fetch me a rag. There is blood in my mouth.”

Jan found Abigael’s rag bag and wiped the blood from inside Henrik’s
mouth. Henrik coughed and Jan wiped more away.

“Now tell me,” Jan repeated.

Henrik stared at Jan. “My arm and my chest hurt. I think my
arm is broken. Perhaps my ribs also.”

“
Ja
, I can see that.” Jan gingerly felt along Henrik’s
left forearm where the break was. “We will send for Fraulein Engel, eh? She
knows how to set broken bones.”

Henrik was quiet and avoided Jan’s eyes. “You are not
telling all. What are you not saying, Henrik?”

Henrik continued to avoid looking at Jan. Jan sat beside him
and wiped more blood from the corner of his mouth. And waited.

When Henrik at last spoke, his words pierced Jan’s heart. “When
the ox fell on me, I felt something break in my back. At first it hurt. Now I
cannot feel my legs.”

Jan blinked. He reached over and touched Henrik’s left foot.
“Do you feel that?”

“No.”

Jan touched his other foot. “And that?”

“I feel nothing.”

“Try to move your foot, Henrik.”

“I have been trying since you and Søren freed me from the
ox,” Henrik whispered.

Jan covered his eyes with his hand.
Ah, Lord!

Fraulein Engel came and tended to Henrik’s injuries as best
she could. She set his arm and with a grave expression nodded when Søren
translated Henrik’s fears to her.

“You know what this means?” she asked Henrik softly.

Henrik looked away and nodded.

When she had done what she could, she called Abigael and asked
her to sit next to Henrik. Seating herself, Fraulein Engel took Abigael’s hand.
Jan and Søren stood nearby so that Søren could tell Abigael and Henrik what Fraulein
Engel was saying.

“Abigael,” she began gently, “Henrik is injured inside. His
back is likely broken. He cannot move his lower body.”

Abigael’s eyes skittered from Fraulein Engel to her husband
and back. “What does that mean?”

Fraulein Engel squeezed Abigael’s hand and recaptured her attention.
“He will not leave this bed, dear sister. I know you will care for him as long
as is needed.” That was all Fraulein Engel said, but the sympathy in her eyes told
Abigael everything.

That had been more than a week ago. Henrik had not improved.

Jan and Søren helped Henrik and Abigael’s sons with the
work. Jan encouraged and prayed with the two boys who, in the span of a day, were
required to shoulder all their father’s responsibilities.

Jan stared toward the Andersons’ farm. Henrik would not see
another spring, perhaps not even another month. The signs were certain. Then
what would Abigael do?

Lord, please strengthen Abigael and Henrik for what is
ahead.

In February they buried Henrik. At Abigael’s request they laid
him to rest within the Thoresens’ cemetery.

“My sons do not wish to give up their father’s land,” Abigael
told Amalie and Jan. “But Henrik told me before he died that they are too young
for us to hold out here. I can already see that—but
my sons
do not see
it . . . yet.”

She looked from the graves toward their house. “I do not
want them to give up their schooling forever either. In a year, I think, we
will return to our families, mine and Henrik’s, in Illinois. It would break my
heart to leave Henrik buried on land that will someday belong to others.”

Amalie put her arm around Abigael and wept with her. “It is
good that you bury him here with our loved ones. We will tend his grave for you
when you leave.”

~~**~~