And yet I woke up in a choke hold, covered in slick, salty sweat.
“That Oscar is long gone now,” John said the night after she had asked me to go. “He did not find a thing. I think it’s only because Bella and Mads fought like they did that people think such vile things now.”
“I know,” I mumbled into the pillow. “But it was that date he died . . .” This was the closest I had ever come to voicing my shameful doubt, and John took a hold of me and pulled me close to his chest.
“Hush,” he whispered into my hair, to soothe me while I shivered in his arms. “Perhaps he did it himself, with all those powders the doctor described. Maybe he didn’t want to be ill anymore.”
“That’s what she said,” I whispered back. The scent of his nightshirt was a comfort; it smelled of him and clean cotton.
“If she had wanted to kill him, she would have done so a long time ago—she wouldn’t have waited sixteen years to do so.”
I let out my breath then; it was such a relief to hear him say it in his calm, composed voice. Of course she had not done it. Of course I believed her. Of course!
“I worry about the children, though,” he whispered to me next. “She does have a temper, your sister, and without Mads there to take the brunt of it—”
“I know.” Something tightened in my chest. “I do too,” I admitted.
And that was why I agreed to go after all.
* * *
—
We had a compartment to ourselves during the train ride: Bella, her girls, Nora, and I. The girls all found it such a treat to sit upon the green velvet upholstery and watch the spring landscape pass by outside the window. Jennie and Myrtle knelt together on one of the seats, the shorter girl in front of the other, and Nora took it upon herself to show little Lucy the view as well, lifting the girl up to the glass to watch the fields and the trees bursting with fall’s vivid colors. Flat—it was all so flat out there. It gave me a headache to look at it. I never thought much of it in the city, with all the tall buildings everywhere, but once I left the crowded streets of Chicago, the flatness of the land was dizzying. It was as if my eyes still searched for steep hills and snow-capped mountains, ravines, clefts, and rushing waterfalls.
I felt like a stranger then.
The children’s hands, sticky from the sugary treats Bella had brought, left marks on the windowpane. The scent of caramels and hard orange candy mingled with that of smoke and wood polish inside the first-class compartment.
Bella had money now.
“Look, there’s a cow,” Jennie told Myrtle. Her hand was looped around the little girl’s waist to keep her steady as the train moved. “Can you see that, Myrtle? Oh, there’s another one.”
Nora hoisted Lucy higher in the air to make sure the little one did not miss out on the cows either, though she did not seem much interested. She held a grappling doll of leather in her hand and gnawed at it eagerly. Yet Nora insisted, “Can you see that, Lucy? That’s a cow. A C-O-W. You can ride one of them like a horse when you get older.”
“No, she cannot,” I corrected my daughter. “Cows are for milk, and beef, dear.”
“Oh!” She puckered up her lips. It sometimes astounded me how witless she could be—thoughtless, more like it. At thirteen, she still had not found the patience required to learn things properly. Her mind was like a frog, leaping around in the grass. She had a boundless energy, though, and was almost never sullen. I was very happy to have brought her along as she could brighten any room with her presence.
“Mama says she will teach me how to ride a horse,” Jennie spoke up, “when we have moved to the country.”
I gave my sister a quizzical look, which she did not return.
“We have to find a good horse first,” she said to Jennie. “An old and patient one that won’t throw you off.”
“Can Myrtle ride it too?” Jennie bent her head over her charge so her slick blond braid fell down and teased the younger girl’s forehead.
“When she is old enough.” Bella gave them both a smile.
“I want to ride a cow.” Nora’s laughter filled the compartment. I had aimed to gather her dark hair in a neat plait, but it was already unraveling down her back.
“Of course you do,” I tutted at her. “You could join the circus as Nora, the cow-riding girl.”
“Uh-huh, and then I could sell milk to the crowd at intermissions. You could go too, Jennie! We could perform together. You could have a horse!”
“A white one.” Jennie joined in the dream. “Its name is Snowbell, or Winter Queen.”
I looked up to see Bella smile to herself, clearly enjoying the girls’ happy chatter. Bella’s girls wore new blue dresses with neat white collars, but Nora’s secondhand one was not so very bad either, with a little bit of lace adorning the red cotton. They were all lovely girls—happy girls. I thought I had been wrong to worry.
Bella and I had both brought our knitting and were spending the time making socks. Bella’s were in the style that were much favored back home with eight-petaled roses, knitted black on white. I could tell by the size that they were for a man.
“Who are they for?” I nodded to her lap.
“Oh, I don’t know yet.” But I thought that she did because her cheeks reddened and a little bit of light had come into her eyes.
“A Norwegian, I’m sure,” I teased her. “No one else will wear socks such as those.”
“Oh, you never know who’ll be in need of a pair.” She huffed a little and started a new row. Above her on the shelf resided a magnificent black hat with a whole flower garden gathered at the pull. It much dwarfed my plain one of straw.
We had brought a deck of cards and books for the older girls to read, but mostly they wanted to explore, so we let them roam as they pleased on the train, though we warned them to behave. Myrtle and Lucy remained with us. The latter was soon sleeping, sprawled out on two empty seats and covered in a crocheted blanket. Myrtle sat quietly by her mother’s side, watching the landscape flow by. She had always been such a docile child, and slow to walk and speak. She did not look like us at all but was darker and had softer features. She looked nothing like her sister either. Little Lucy was fair and always alert.
The day had been so good so far, and Bella’s mood so nice, that I finally found the courage to ask what had been on my mind for some time.
“Do you think you will have more children?” I started, noting the ash in her hair as I did.
“Oh, I don’t know.” She briefly looked up from the knitting. “Why do you ask?”
“I just think it’s strange that a woman your age has so many all of a sudden, when she couldn’t have a single one before.” I did not say it to be mean, only because I wondered.