CHAPTER 1

SUMMER 1897

She woke to a morning just like any other. The sweet stench of the barnyard wafted through an open window. Gray light not yet golden slid past the cotton curtains, creating a silhouette of the kerosene lamp against the bare wall. Louisa wiggled her cold toes under the patchwork quilt, feeling her adolescent body begin to stir. Across the room, her white Mennonite kapp hung on a hook like a disembodied ghost, tie strings shivering in the draft. Today the farmhouse was silent; no rattle of woodstove grate nor banging of pots and pans in the kitchen below her room. The quiet was unusual, strange, and in that moment of awakening, the realization hit her. Mama was dead.

When had that been? Only yesterday. Trying to escape the horrible reality, she pulled the quilt over her head, but the memories rose unbidden.

*         *         *

Her mother’s agonizing scream echoed through the house. A newborn’s guttural cry … goose bumps on Louisa’s skin…

Sucking in her breath, she flung back the bedcovers, bare feet on the cold plank floor. Her heart pounded like a stone sledge as she grabbed her shawl. That’s when she noticed a lathered horse and buggy at the farmhouse gate.

Peering into the hallway, she heard unfamiliar voices in her parents’ bedroom. The door opened and a midwife emerged carrying a small bundle in her arms. Louisa only got a glimpse of the infant’s head, protruding tongue, and lips in a bloated face.

“Mama?” she gasped.

“Doctor’s with her.” Clutching the baby, the midwife quickly disappeared down the stairs.

A few moments later her father, Herzig, emerged. His eyes were heavy and his voice broken.

“Mama … haf bad time. Ve must pray.” He bowed his bearded head, gnarled hands covering a weathered face.

“Lieber Gott im Himmel … Grant us Grace … Amen.”

“Papa?” Louisa’s throat went dry and she croaked, “The baby?”

“Ach. Little girl. Nein breathing right. God’s hands.”

“May I see Mama?”

Emotionally spent, Herzig just nodded.

An acrid smell of blood and ammonia greeted Louisa at the bedroom door. She motioned to her sister-in-law. “Get something to eat. I’ll sit with Mama awhile.”

“She’s very weak,” Genevieve cautioned, gathering up a pile of blood-soaked bedding as she left the room. Louisa’s stomach knotted when she saw the bright red stains.         

She drew a chair up to her parents’ double bed and reached for her mother’s hand lying on the quilt. Even though it was still summer, Mama’s hand looked white and her face pallid against the muslin sheets. Louisa’s warm fingers covered her mother’s and she whispered, “Mama, it’s a baby girl!”

She thought she saw a tiny smile crease the edges of the lavender lips. Or had she just imagined it? “Everything will be all right, Mama,” she said with a confidence she didn’t feel. “I love you.”

Clara was a warm, comfortable woman, and even at seventeen years Louisa felt protected by the easy confidence, humor, and compassion of her Mennonite mother. Every stranger who knocked on the door was offered a meal and a place to stay. The Steinbacher family didn’t have much in the way of worldly goods, but meat and vegetables were plentiful on the farm. Another mouth to feed was really no trouble. Her mother cooked three meals a day until she became heavy with child. As eldest daughter, Louisa took on more of the cooking, then the washing and mending. Over the last weeks of confinement, her mother’s strength waned, until finally she had taken to bed. Louisa bent close to catch her mother’s whispered words: “Up to you now, Louisa. Take care of Lydia … Noah … the homeplace. You’re a woman grown … Papa needs you.”

The next thing she knew, Dr. Baughman and her father were leaning over the bed. “It’s time to say goodbye, Herzig,” the doctor said in a gruff undertone.

Mama’s motionless hand was cool as spring water. Startled and fearful, Louisa withdrew. Looking back into the room, she saw her father fall to his knees pleading, “Clara … Clara … Ich liebe dich.”

It seemed like hours before he came down the stairs, defeat in his footsteps. At the kitchen doorway he mumbled, “Auf Wiedersehen, Liebchen,” and crumpled into his chair.

The next day the doctor summoned Papa to town. On return, he stoically informed his family the baby had a lung defect and had died also.

*         *         *

Louisa bent over the pale, lifeless form and straightened the white dress covering the body she and her sisters-in-law had washed and prepared for burial. In a daze she touched the cold skin and pulled away with a shiver. This was not her Mama—it was some cruel mistake.

Her brothers laid the body in an open casket in the parlor, where they had pushed the furniture against the wall to make space. The room felt empty and somber. Papa, who had stayed up all night in a vigil over his wife’s body, stood in the doorway wearing his plain coat and broad-brimmed hat. She and her four siblings stood by his side, including the two older brothers with farms and families of their own. The Mennonite minister arrived in a black frock coat, high hat, and boots, and consoled the family in low, measured tones.

The Steinbachers’ bell rang out over the neighboring farmlands, its clang sad and ominous. Country folk came from miles around to pay their respects. Horses and buggies filled the barnyard and overflowed into the fields. Word got out to the hobo community too, and the line of tattered-clothed men at the back door lengthened.

Louisa wandered into the kitchen where women in dark dresses and white kapps were bringing casseroles and side dishes. As they bustled around on their mission of mercy, her head spun and she slumped against a wall. The aroma of pork sausage stew that hung in the air turned her stomach. Pies and pastries overflowed the large kitchen table—it was all overwhelming. She returned to the parlor to be with her father, sister, and brothers.

There, more women hovered around the afflicted family, patting hands and whispering words of sympathy. They would continue to bring consolation in the form of food for weeks following the funeral. A steady stream of do-gooders and well-wishers would make their way up the lane to the Steinbachers’, bringing casseroles, fresh vegetables, and home-baked bread. This was how they cared for unfortunate members of the flock. Clara had done the same for those who suffered illness and loss.

Half-grateful and half-numb, Louisa and her family accepted the outpouring of the Mennonite community, gestures of sympathy born of religious conviction. Their mother was forty-five years old; they could not grasp the reality of her absence. Nothing further was said about the baby. When it came time to cover Mama’s plain wooden coffin with dirt, the child was not mentioned. Louisa did not question her father; that was not fitting. Perhaps he blamed the baby for his wife’s death; maybe he blamed himself. Whatever the reason, at the gravesite no small body was buried with its mother.

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