The Last Letter Home Read online

  Mrs. Henry O. Jackson, sitting here in her home in Stillwater, is not young any more. She who with closed eyes views the June wedding in her homeland will soon be a woman of many years. Soon her cheeks will be flabby, the wrinkles spreading, and the legs under her heavy body unsteady. But she can sit and dream in this joyful knowledge: Even after her death she will stand as bride in Ljuder church, year in, year out.

  Ulrika of Västergöhl has finally been vindicated in Sweden. She has been turned into the eternal crown-bride.

  XXII

  THE FARMER AND THE OAK

  —1—

  Strong, well-muscled young men were growing up at Lake Chisago’s oldest settlement. Four sons had grown into men. Two were as tall as the father, two taller. Any one of them could manage a job requiring a full-grown man. All were broad across the shoulders, strong in limbs, keen and handy. Their growth into manhood was the greatest change that had taken place at this settlement.

  Karl Oskar retained a father’s authority over his sons; this must remain his as long as they ate his bread and lived in his house. But the older they grew the less he knew about them. He was together with his boys in work, but outside the home they lived their own lives. He was the hermit, seldom away from home, they were lively, often away, associating with other people. And father and sons already used different languages when they spoke with each other. The children more and more discarded their mother tongue for English—when he addressed them in Swedish they would reply in English. This seemed awkward to him and plainly askew. At first he tried to correct them, but by and by he became accustomed to it and after some time it no longer bothered him. There was nothing he could do about it, so perhaps it was better to say nothing. After all, his children were right; he must not hinder them from speaking their country’s language. In the settlements hereabouts Swedish was all right, but outside the Chisago Lake district they had little use for their mother tongue. The surer they became in English, the easier would be their success in this country.

  Karl Oskar’s children were to be saved from the language difficulties he had gone through in America. How hadn’t it hindered him! How many humiliations hadn’t he endured because he couldn’t speak the country’s language. At last he managed, but like other Swedes at Chisago Lake he used his own brand of English, strongly mixed with the old language. He would never learn anything else. Lately he more and more forgot the new since he seldom went beyond his farm, and he fell back on Swedish.

  He felt that his children, when outsiders were present, were ashamed of their father’s way of speaking. The children didn’t understand, couldn’t understand, how much easier it was for them. All he could do was to pretend he didn’t know they were ashamed of their father’s expressions.

  With the growing children, the new language came into the house and expelled the old. It didn’t even spare the name their home had had from the beginning. Karl Oskar’s children no longer called their home New Duvemåla. They had given it another name, a name used by people who spoke of the first settlement at Chisago Lake. New Duvemåla was no more, it was gone and would never be revived. Instead it was now called the Nilsson Settlement.

  —2—

  The oak grove to the east of the house still stood, covering about twenty acres of fertile land where crops could grow. For ten years Karl Oskar had had his eye on this piece of ground. Then a mild, suitable autumn arrived which was to be the grove’s last; the days of the mighty oaks were numbered.

  It had taken the farmer a long time to plan his attack on the oaks; this fall the plan was completed, now he had thought it over long enough. He had figured out how to go about it, how to turn this ground into a tilled field: The giant trees would be pulled up by the roots.

  Now with the boys he had sufficient help, and Karl Oskar Nilsson and his four sons approached the grove with their team one early morning. Five men and two horses—the combined strength of men and beasts would fell the old oaks.

  They began with one of the largest; they dug a ditch around the tree, four feet deep, and cut the roots. They took away the foothold of the oak. This was the trick to conquer it: Deprive it of its hold. They began down at the root; when the ditch was ready two of the boys climbed up the tree with a heavy iron chain, as high as they could get. They fastened it to the trunk and the father joined it to the pull lines from the team.

  Human labor had done its part, now it was the turn of the beasts; the horses would fell the tree. But the oak itself would help, its weight would facilitate its fall.

  The farmer picked up the reins and urged his strong team forward which he had followed for years after harrow and plow, wagon and timber sled. Today it was hitched to the heaviest load it had ever pulled, a giant oak which for hundreds of years had stood secure on its roots. Now the old one’s footing had been undermined.

  The horses obeyed their master and started to pull, concentrating all their strength until their backs straightened out and their legs and loins sank. Their hooves took hold of the ground, turf and rocks flew about, the animals tramped, moved their legs, stretched their sinews. The hooves dug into the earth. The pull lines were extended until it seemed as if they would break, the horses crouched as if ready to bolt, their backs straightened out, their hindquarters sank down. But they did not move from the spot; they stood where they were, tramped the same place. They were hitched to a load that remained stationary.

  The driver of the team kept urging it on. The horses pulled again, their hooves threw up turf. This was their life’s heaviest load.

  Now the oak began to tremble from the force pulling in the chains around its trunk. The enormous crown swayed slowly back and forth. The men could see that the oak was beginning to lean. Once it had started to sway, its motion would soon utilize its weight in making it fall.

  The team in its place pulled again, the giant trunk was beginning to give, the lines slackened—they were long enough so the tree would not reach the team in its fall.

  The farmer and his sons cried out warnings to one another, the calls echoing back and forth:

  “Timber!”

  “She’s coming!”

  “Get away!”

  The tree was leaning. A sound like an approaching storm was heard in the air—the tree had started to fall! The giant took one last heavy breath as it sank to the ground. In falling the tree had pulled up its own stump. When the branches hit the earth there was a report like a gunshot. Then the great oak lay still. It had left an empty place in the air above.

  The giant was felled, the first one. Five men and two horses had gone to work on the grove—oak after oak fell, each pulling up its roots with its fall. The warning calls sounded: Keep away! She’s coming! And heavy and big she came, roaring through the air, falling with a thud, her roots in the air, her crown crushed. In the place where the tree had grown, a ditch opened, deep as a grave. Each fallen oak left room for a piece of fallow field.

  It was the autumn of the great oak destruction; death ravaged the grove. The owner and his four sons cleared ground—the farmer was using all the human strength that had grown up in his house. This work by the father and his sons would complete the clearing of this farm. In the evenings, tired and pleased, they looked at the row of oaks they had felled, quietly laid down their tools, and went home.

  For more than twenty years Karl Oskar had cleared wild land in America, hoed, plowed, cut. Now he had started with the last piece. He was nearing the end. When the oak grove had been cleared and tilled his farm would be completed.

  —3—

  The clearing went on through the whole autumn. Karl Oskar hoped to be through before snow fell and the ground froze. And the winter was late this year, as if it wanted to aid him in his work.

  It was an evening late in November. Only one oak remained, but one of the largest, a giant, almost six feet thick at arm’s height. At the time when this tree was a sapling the farmer’s parents had not yet come into the world, nor his grandparents. And when he himself saw the shore of Lak
e Ki-Chi-Saga for the first time, the oak had reached its full years. It had remained in its place while he felled thousands of trees around it. Now its turn had come: the autumnal storms had swayed its crown for the last time.

  It was this oak the farmer was to remember.

  The first blue approach of twilight appeared in the sky. The farmer’s oldest son said it was late, they were tired, and since this last oak was so big and deeply rooted it would be quite a job getting it down. It would be dark before they were through. Couldn’t they leave it till tomorrow?

  The farmer replied that since only one single oak remained they would fell it too before they went home. Since it was the last one they must not leave it because of approaching evening. With the felling of this tree they could say they had completed their task. Then they could go home and rest, well satisfied.

  He spoke with a father’s authority over his children and the four sons obeyed him. None of them uttered a word of complaint.

  They went to work eagerly, stimulated by the thought that they were to fell the last oak. They dug the ditch around the trunk, two boys climbed up and fastened the chain to the top, the chain was linked to the team. The horses too were eager, as if feeling this must be the last load of growing trees.

  The father picked up the reins and laid them around his neck. He urged the team, the horses caught a foothold in the ground and pulled until the harnesses creaked. But he did not keep his eyes on the team, rather, his eyes followed the movements of the oak crown that swayed behind him. He was always watchful, never forgetting to call out: Timber!

  But tonight it was the sons who called out to the father:

  “She’s coming! Get away!”

  The giant oak was not so well rooted as they had thought. As soon as the horses pulled it began to rock and lean.

  The thud of its fall could be heard almost in the same second as the warning:

  “She’s coming! Get away!”

  In a wink the father saw the tree coming. He always jumped aside in good time—when he heard the sound in the air he always had time to get away. Now he tried to throw himself aside at the same moment he heard it.

  It happened within seconds: The oak was supposed to fall to the right of him, he attempted to run to the left—he who couldn’t run! He couldn’t get his left leg to move fast enough, he stumbled and fell to his knees. He rose again but never reached an upright position; he took no more steps in his flight from the tree. He had the reins around his neck, the horses were restless and pulled him over.

  The farmer fell as if his legs had been cut out from under him; over him fell the oak.

  It crashed and thundered as its branches broke and splintered. The team came to a stop, the reins coiling behind as they fell from the master’s neck. They had pulled their load, the last one in the grove, their labor was completed, and now they rested.

  The roar from the fall died down and silence fell over team and tree, until the sons rushed up and called out: Father!

  The last oak of the grove had been felled but under it lay the farmer himself. This mighty tree, waiting here for him while the years had run by—it had been waiting for this November evening when they would fall together.

  None of the sons had seen their father stumble and be pulled over by the reins. Now he had vanished; he must be under the fallen tree, the lush branches must be hiding him. They grabbed their axes and started to cut through the branch-work—boughs as big as trunks were separated and rolled away in horrible urgency. The sons were hewing their way to their father. Four axes were swinging and with each cut they were nearing him. Soon they could see his clothing; they saw his boots, heels up; they found his hat, brushed from his head. They worked in silence as they cut their way through the enormous oak. The last branch was like a tree in itself, and it lay across their father’s back; he was pressed under it. In its fall the giant had seized the farmer with one of its strongest arms and pressed him against the ground. He was a prisoner of the oak.

  The four sons cut their father free, liberated him from the mighty tree’s grip. They rolled away the heavy limb that pressed his back and stood around him, axes in hand.

  He lay on his stomach, his face against the earth. They bent over him. His legs moved a little, his shoulders rose perceptibly. His boot toes scraped against the ground, but his head lay still. But he moved. He was alive.

  The sons had been silent as they worked their way toward the father; now they spoke:

  “Father! Are you hurt? Can you talk?”

  They received not a word in reply, only a deep breath. But when they took him by the shoulders he stirred again. He tried to turn over; slowly, with its own strength, his body turned on its back. Even his head began to move, and the sons saw a face distorted, barely recognizable. It was not cut, no injury was visible, but great puffs of froth showed in the corners of his mouth; his teeth were bared, in a cramp-like bite; his eyebrows were pulled together at the root of his nose, which was poking up at them, enormous, protuberant, like a knot.

  “How did it happen? Are you terribly hurt?”

  A hissing sound escaped the mouth of the fallen one. He groaned, his teeth clenched so hard it showed in his cheekbones. It was pain that had changed his face.

  He felt his back with his hands and groaned again. Then he began slowly to pull up his knees. He could move both arms and legs.

  When the sons had first seen him on his stomach, pressed down under the oak, they had not expected him to move again. And as yet they did not know what had happened to him, as yet he said nothing. He rose slowly to his knees, his facial muscles tightening. Again he felt his back, his hands groping about. But his back seemed to be all right; it could not be broken.

  The farmer looked about as if in great confusion. He looked at his sons around him, from one to the other, searching for an answer: Was it really true? Could he still move? Then he must be alive. He was alive, and no one was more surprised than he.

  He looked at the fallen oak beside him. One of its heaviest limbs had pressed upon his back, and now when he looked closer he understood why he was alive; he had fallen into a small hollow. Without this slim depression his body would have been crushed.

  If he hadn’t fallen into that hollow he would never have risen again. If he had happened to fall a foot to the right or a foot to the left he would have remained fallen. If he had taken one step more before he fell he would have been dead.

  The farmer said to his sons who stood there apprehensively that he had had a close call. The bough had almost got him. Only a hairsbreadth and they might have had to carry home a corpse this evening.

  They stood silent at the thought. Then they asked about his injuries. Did he want them to carry him home?

  The father replied that the oak had given him a sound lash across the back and he did not feel well after it. But he thought he could get home on his own legs. If they took the horses and the tools he would try to walk.

  Cautiously he attempted to rise from his kneeling position. He wasn’t successful; the attempt caused him such intense pain that everything turned black before his eyes and he felt dizzy. When he tried to move one foot he reeled. He sank down on his knees again.

  There was nothing to do but accept the sons’ offer.

  They made a litter for their father from a few branches of the oak they had felled, tying them together with the reins. It was a clumsy, primitive litter, but it would hold for the short distance home. There were four of them and each could carry a corner.

  So this evening the farmer was carried home by his sons after his last full working day.

  —4—

  For a few months Karl Oskar stayed in bed and put plasters on his injured back. A thick blue-black swelling appeared across the small of his back where the oak had hit him. He rubbed the injured part with different kinds of salves for which he sent to the new drugstore in Center City. Some he also mixed himself and with the aid of neighbors. He tried cotton oil and camphor, sheep-fat, pork, unsalted butte
r. He had leeches put on the swelling—they sat so close, those nasty sucking critters, that they covered his whole back; they drank his blood and swelled up until they were so fat and thick and round they couldn’t suck any more and fell off and died. Rows of itching wounds were left from their sharp bites.

  The first weeks in bed he was kept awake through the nights by the pain. It felt like a firebrand in his back. But after repeated applications of leeches the swelling went down, the soreness eased, and the pain abated. He thought the critters had sucked out the evil that caused the pain.

  When on that November evening he had heard the oak come down on him so suddenly he had had only one thought: I’m dying! He had time to think of nothing else before he felt the pain and lost his breath. The pressure had been so severe that he was unable to get air into his lungs. His next clear thought had been: Has my back been able to take it? Pressed down under the tree he had felt sure his back was broken.

  He had not been stricken as severely as he had expected but he suffered intense pain afterward. He had to stay in bed for a long time. Fortunately it was winter and there was no urgency on the farm. He need not worry about the daily chores; his four sons attended to those.

  In time Karl Oskar was up on his legs again. But it was spring before he could go back to work. He began with easier chores, but his back was not the same as before: He had to walk with it bent. As soon as he tried to straighten up, the old pain and ache gave him orders: You aren’t able! Don’t try to lift!

  The following autumn Karl Oskar Nilsson and his sons completed the clearing of the oak grove. They stacked the timber, cleared the ground of stumps and roots, and plowed the field; and the father participated all the time in the work. It was his last clearing, he must see it through. Then his farm would be completed.