—
All my foster children left in the end. Both Anne and Lizzie went back to their mothers. I told myself I had always known the girls were borrowed, but it did not prevent me from missing their happy chatter and their light steps on my floors. The rooms seemed so very empty without them. James brought me other children, but they never stayed for as long as I liked. Whenever he appeared with a bundle for me to take, I already knew that the child would not stay, and so the bliss of motherhood eluded me.
In dark nights, with my jaw aching, I would cradle my empty belly in my hands and will it to come alive. Just one seed, one blessed stickling, to whisk all my misery away. I often wished I could bring Anders back to life, so I could kill him again for taking it all away from me—but none of my wishing could fill my womb.
The one thing to bring me solace happened in late 1888, when Mads sat me down by the kitchen table, which was not as white as ivory anymore but had taken on a gray, dusty shade.
“Do you recall the girl I told you about? Ole Olson’s daughter?” he asked me.
“Of course!” How could I not? Mads had often spoken of his friend’s wife, who was unlikely to survive after a hard birth. She had lingered for some months, but her prospects were dire. The couple had asked us to take the child should the mother die but the daughter survive. I had thought of the girl every day since, and visited the vacant children’s room where the little beds and the neatly folded clothes lay ready to welcome a new child.
“They want us to come, tonight. The poor woman is not expected to survive much longer.” Mads’s bottom lip quivered. He felt sad for his friend, who was losing a wife.
“How old is the girl now?” I could only think of her.
“Eight months.” Mads’s face was grave before me, respectful of the circumstances, but I could not be more joyous. Eight months was perfect. She would have no memory of her first mother as she grew older, and could easily be weaned of the milk.
“I’ll go change my dress.” I wanted to go at once, and that very same night I met Jennie for the first time. Fair of hair and blue of eyes, always so quiet and gentle.
Her mother was close to death when we arrived, but she found the strength to place the swaddled child in my arms. With her face pale and damp against the pillows, she made me swear to keep her as my own, which I readily did. I even had a smile for my husband that night, for facilitating this happy occasion through his friendship. He might not have given me much of what I wanted, but this he had managed at least.
I felt triumphant when I left that bedside, as if I finally had received some justice—payment for all I had suffered. It was nothing more than what I deserved.
Jennie was mine ever since.
18.
Chicago, 1893
The World’s Columbian Exposition overtook Chicago with a glorious madness. Out of the swamp rose a city of gleaming white, with all the wonders of the world inside, from the thousands of singers in the Choral Hall to the hundreds of roses in the Horticultural Building. You could see a map of pickles, a bridge of sugar, a chocolate Columbus, and a castle of soap. There was even a Viking ship, rowed all the way from Norway.
Had Jennie been a little older, I might have seen more of it, but she was at five a delicate child whose feet easily tired, and so we mostly stayed away. I did not feel bereft, however; my days with Jennie brought me more joy than any of the magnificence to be seen. Finally, I had a child without a living mother, and though she did have a father, I never truly feared that he would come and take her away—fathers so rarely miss their children.
All through the world fair year, the Norwegians gathered in a beer garden on the Midway. The latter was not a part of the fair but had become one nevertheless, with sword dancers, snake charmers, and beautiful girls on display. I had been there before with Mads, but he did not care much for excessive drinking, and the cigar smoke made his eyes water. He had wanted me to settle for a cup of hot cocoa. I insisted on gin.
This night I was alone with no surly husband in tow, and I meant to make the most of it. I had hired a girl to mind my darling Jennie, who would be sleeping soundly in her bed by now, her fair head resting on lace-edged pillows. Surely she would not mind my absence for one night. My friends from church were not there, of course, but I reacquainted myself with some of Nellie’s friends from Milwaukee Avenue. They were still a rowdy lot, still eager to drink and dance. We sat at long tables in a pavilion lit by electric lightbulbs. A dusky woman dressed in red played the violin; colorful pennants hung from the ceiling. We lifted our glasses to king and country and to our Viking ancestors. It was pleasant to hear my mother tongue all around me, the singsong tunes of the dialects.
“Did you see the Javanese orchestra yet?” Nellie’s old neighbor, Clara, asked. She had a beer in her hand and her eyes were glassy with drink. She had not quite taken to me back when I lived with John and Nellie—none of my sister’s friends had, truth be told—but the brew seemed to have made her forget that we were never the best of friends.
“No.” I shook my head. “Not yet. Do you come here often?”
“As often as I can. I won’t miss a moment of the fair if I can help it.” She threw back her head and laughed, showing off gums with a few teeth missing. I ran my tongue over the sharp edge of my own broken tooth.
“Mads thinks it too expensive to go.” I could not help but roll my eyes.
“That’s why he isn’t here, then?” She looked around as if he would suddenly appear in the crowd.
“He is working, poor soul, but he doesn’t begrudge me a night of fun.” I forced myself not to smile from the lie.
“Sounds like a kind man.” Beer sloshed from her glass and ran down her fingers. “My husband wouldn’t be so kind if I went here without him.”
“He probably likes to have fun, then, your husband.” I looked down the length of the table, at all the laughing, red-faced Norwegians. “There are so many visitors from outside the city. I guess they all want to see the fair.”
“Some came up from Minnesota yesterday and my cousin came from Indiana last week. Who would want to miss out on it?”
“Have Nellie and John been down tonight?”
Clara shook her head. “No, I haven’t seen them. I suppose Nellie is ill again. You know how it is with her back.”
“Our mother was the same,” I told her. “It’s the child carrying that does it, I think.”
Clara shrugged. “Such a shame, but it’s what we do best, isn’t it? Carrying that lot.”