Her Mother’s Hope

Clotilde peered out the tent-house door. “Where’s Mama going?”

“She’s taking a walk. Don’t bother her. Go on outside for a while. Everything is fine. Bernhard, make certain she doesn’t get near Mrs. Miller’s roses.” Papa lifted Hildemara carefully onto his lap. He brushed the hair back from her face and kissed her cheeks. “Mrs. Ransom won’t be your teacher anymore. She went to Mr. Loyola after you and Clotilde ran away. She quit her job, Liebling.”

“She hates me, Papa. She’s always hated me.”

“I don’t think she hates you anymore.”

Hildie’s mouth wobbled and she burst out crying again. “I prayed for her, Papa. I wanted Mrs. Ransom to like me. I prayed and prayed and my prayers never changed anything.”

Papa pressed her head gently against his shoulder. “Prayers changed you, Hildemara. You learned to love your enemy.”

20

1924

Papa heard about a farm for sale on Hopper Road, two miles northwest of Murietta. When he went to town for supplies, he came back the long way to see it; he talked to Mama about it. After seeing it for herself, Mama bargained with the bank over the property, but-“They wouldn’t budge on the price, so I left.”

“Well, that’s it, then.” Papa despaired.

“We’re just getting started, Niclas. That place has stood fallow for two years. No one has made an offer. If we wait, they’ll come around.”

While they waited, Mama told Papa to make up a list of what he would need in the way of equipment and tools to work the farm, as Mama made up her own list of needed items. She went into town three times over the next week, but never set foot in the bank. She went again the following week, and the banker came outside to talk with her.

“He wanted to negotiate.” Mama laughed. “I told him I’d done my negotiating. The place isn’t worth any more than we offered.”

“So? What did he say?”

“We can have it.”

Both Mama and Papa went back two days later to sign the papers. They came home arguing. “We could’ve paid the full amount in cash and not had a mortgage.”

“You have to spend money to make it, Niclas. We’re not going to run up debt at the hardware store and the general store and the feed store. Let the bank carry the paper for a few years, not ordinary folks who work hard to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads.”

Papa went out and bought a sorrel farm horse and sturdy wagon. He had just started dismantling the tent- house when Mrs. Miller came outside and said Papa had deserted her in her time of need. She said a decent man wouldn’t leave a widow and her daughter to fend for themselves, then claimed Papa had no right to take what belonged to her, and he had better leave the tent-house exactly where it was or she’d have the sheriff after him.

Mama held her temper until the last demand. Then she stepped between them. “Now that you’ve had your say, I’ll have mine.” Papa cringed as Mama went nose to nose with Mrs. Miller. When Mrs. Miller stepped back, Mama stepped forward. “Ring up the sheriff, Mrs. Miller. Please! I’d like to show him all the receipts for everything we’ve had to buy over the last two years just to keep a canvas roof over our heads. People ought to know how you and that lazy daughter of yours sit around all day doing nothing but stuffing your faces.” For every step Mrs. Miller took backward, Mama advanced, hands in tight fists. When Mrs. Miller turned and ran, Mama shouted after her. “Maybe I’ll post a notice in town. Looking for work? Don’t go to the Miller place! ”

Hildemara shook with fear. “Will she call the sheriff now, Papa? Will he come and take you and Mama to jail?”

Mama gave her such a look. “We’re in the right, Hildemara Rose.” She gave Papa a hard glare, too. “Scripture says a worker is due his wages. Doesn’t it? It’s about time the ox got his meal!” She pulled a stack of receipts out of one of the boxes. “And I have the papers to prove we haven’t stolen one thing.” She kicked her foot out. “Not even the dust!” She stuffed the receipts in her pocket and went back to packing.

When everything was ready to go, Papa and Mama rode on the high seat of the wagon, baby Rikki on Mama’s lap. Hildemara climbed into the back with Bernie and Clotilde. They whooped like wild Indians as they drove off Mrs. Miller’s place. Mama laughed. They stopped in town at the hardware store and Papa bought shovels, rakes, hoes, pruners, short and tall ladders, large and small saws, a bucket of nails, and sailcloth. He placed an order for poles, baling wire, and lumber to be delivered later. Mama went to Hardesty’s, her own list to fill: a sewing machine, buckets of paint, brushes, and a bolt of yellow and green chintz.

On the way to the new place, the wagon bed piled high with all their purchases, Clotilde pressed in between Papa and Mama on the high seat, while Mama held Rikki. Hildie followed on foot with Bernie. When Papa turned in to the yard, Hildemara thanked Jesus she wouldn’t have to walk any farther. She felt a rush of excitement at the sight of a barn, an open shed with an old plow, a windmill, and a house with a towering chinaberry tree in the front yard. A huge century plant grew on the opposite side of the driveway.

“All this belongs to us?”

“Us and the bank,” Papa called back.

Hildie ran up the steps, but the front door had a padlock. The windows had been covered with plywood to protect them from vandals, so she couldn’t see inside. She ran to the end of the porch. “An orange tree! We have an orange tree!” She didn’t care that all the fruit lay rotten on the ground.

“Hildemara!” Mama called as Papa drove toward the barn. “Help unload the wagon!”

As Papa handed tools down, Mama, Bernie, and Hildemara stacked them against the wall. Clotilde sat on the ground holding baby Rikka in her lap. Papa unloaded Rikka’s crib and carried it to the back door of the house, where Mama and Bernie had stacked the folded cots. A huge California bay laurel tree grew thirty feet from the back of the house, its massive arms stretching leafy branches in a hundred directions.

Mama had the keys to the padlock. Papa took them from her. Then he took Rikka and handed her off to Hildemara. “Stand with your brother, Clotilde.” He removed the padlock and tucked it and the keys into his pocket. Grinning, he scooped Mama up in his arms, shouldered the door open, and carried her inside. Muscles straining, Hildemara lugged Rikka up the back steps behind Bernie and Clotilde.

Papa set Mama on her feet. He gave her a quick, firm kiss and whispered in her ear. As he headed for the back door, Mama’s cheeks turned bright red.

Hildemara stood awed. The house had one front bedroom, a large rectangular living room, a kitchen, and a potbelly stove. “It’s so big.”

Mama looked around and sighed. “I used to own a three-story boardinghouse with a big dining room and parlor.” Shaking her head, she went to work. She took Rikka from Hildemara and jerked her chin at Bernie. “Help Papa bring in the cots. Hildemara, you can start sweeping out the bedroom. Start at the far wall and sweep toward the door and then out the front so it won’t blow right back in again.”

As soon as Papa brought the crib inside, Mama put Rikka down for a nap. Mama opened the door of the potbelly stove, took one look inside, and ran out the back door. “Niclas! I need a hammer to take the plywood off the windows, and you have to take the chimney pipe apart! It needs to be cleaned out or we’ll have the house burn down over our heads!”

Papa came in with a bucket of coal. He’d found a bin full in the barn. When Mama finished cleaning out the stove, she started a fire. She left the door open to warm the house, warning Clotilde to stay away. Then she went to work scrubbing the kitchen. “We won’t get it all done today, but we’ll get a good start.”

It started to rain before Papa and Bernie returned from looking over the property. They went right out again after lunch. When Rikka awakened and fussed, Mama nursed her and then told Clotilde to play with her doll and keep Rikka entertained. Mama got on her knees and scraped hunks of congealed grease off the inside walls of the