From the Improvement Era, December 1921 –

Mother’s Christmas Decision at Windrift

By Elizabeth Cannon Porter

Mrs. Davis finished wiping the breakfast dishes, surreptitiously wiped her eyes, and stole away to her room to read the letter again, as if every phrase were not already burned into her brain.

The letter which she took out of the front of her black dress was from her dead husband’s sister, and was characteristic of Myra, who was proud, selfish and childless. At the funeral of John Davis two months before, Myra had intimated to the widow that she would do something for the little family. At the time, she had sent an expensive floral offering and furnished three automobiles.

Now had come her proposition. What she wanted to do for Delia was to take Richard, her second son, away from her. Myra began in her untactful way by saying that it was a question whether Delia could feed the children she already had, much less another one. She would take eight-year-old Dick into her own home; board, clothe and educate him. She and her husband, Samuel Armstrong, would legally adopt him. He would be treated as their own son, and would eventually inherit most of their property, if he did what they wanted him to. He must take their name, and they would brook no interference from his mother. Moreover, Myra wound up, the new baby would probably be a boy and could take his place.

“Just as if one could ever take the place of another!” thought Mrs. Davis. Of her three children reckless, high-spirited Richard most needed a mother’s care, yet she knew it would have been just as hard to part with sober, steady Jack or cherubic, golden-curled little Rob. They had shrewdly picked on Richard as being the handsomest and most dashing of the three. Myra must have style, even in boys. A pang of jealousy shot through Delia when she thought of Myra mothering her black-haired boy. It was hard to imagine Myra mothering anything. Uncle Samuel was a hard man. He had a bank and thought of everything in terms of cash. He would probably put Richard beyond one of those little gilt cages to hand out money – her warm-hearted Dick, with his passion for animals and the open.

If she could just take care of her children she would keep them together. On the other hand, had she the right to keep Richard in poverty when he had the chance to go to a wealthy home? She had been taught that it was wrong to ask for a sign, but she prayed earnestly that she might be directed to do the right thing.

John Davis’ family had never quite forgiven her for marrying im. They had planned for him to go to college and become an engineer. He had come under the charm of lovely Delia Williams and, very much in love, they had married, so, instead of going to the School of Mines, he went to work at Smeltertown. His family blamed his wife for ruining his career.

“We have work and love,” he told the little wife, “and that is all there is in life anyway, my dear.”

Because he tired of the dust and grime of Smeltertown, he bought some land – seventeen acres of it – in the open. It was desert ground and had little to recommend it except an old flowing well and an apple tree. It lay in the valley and afforded a splendid view of the mountains; sometimes there was a breeze from the lake. At night the myriad lights of the golden city twinkled to the ast; to the west gleamed the terraced lights of the smelters. It was a poor little place, but to the young couple ben ton nest building it seemed like an English estate – house and land to own and hand down from father to son.

“We will call it ‘Windrift,’ because the snow banks up here in the winter,” suggested the young wife. They could well laugh at the winter cold, for spring was blossoming around them, and the meadowlarks were trilling their eternal refrain – ‘Windrift is a pretty little place.”

“I tell you, Del,” said her husband, looking up from the ditch where he was planting a row of willows, “there was no shade here for us and may not be for our children, but there will be plenty of shade for our grandchildren.”

Anyone who has dug in the earth knows the joy of making a garden, but to make something grow in a desert place has a still greater thrill. Desert ground that has never produced anything is rich in plant food. Alkali land is like the Sleeping Beauty held in a century of thralldom which needs only the kiss of the Prince, Drainage, to waken to life and beauty.

So the strong man faced the blizzards and went to drive an engine at the smelter, and the woman gathered her brood around her and conserved in the dwelling, and together they made a Home.

One night in autumn, John came home with a cold on his lungs. Delia soaked his feet in mustard water and got him into bed. His fever mounted and he fought for breath. The doctor came and pronounced it the influenza – dread aftermath of the European war. Then quite suddenly, before they had marshaled their forces to combat the disease, he was dead.

Delia had been glad that John was not of the age that had been called into war. She did not want him killed, nor did she want him to kill. Perhaps it is because women know the pain of giving life that they do not believe in taking it. He had not gone to war, but John had died anyway.

Only those who have been bereaved of their loved ones know the terrible transition from life to death – the passing of the spirit. The unbelievable thing that the world can go on about its business when one’s love lies dead; so John Davis, who had known little but toil, was laid away in fine linen at last. They buried him on the hillside in the cemetery ablaze with the tints of autumn, through which a chill wind swept.

Numb, Delia and her orphans returned to the tragedy of the place, bereft of its master. They faced the horror of the empty chair, the loved one’s hat, the unused gloves. In the drear days that followed, the widow found herself watching the road for the form that would never travel it again; she listened in vain for her husband’s voice, or strained her ears for his footfall. Sight of the familiar handwriting gave her heart a spasm of pain. In the vigils of the night when she covered the little forms, she thanked the Lord that she married John young. If he had had only the education it would have died with him, but his children would live after him. She wondered if his folks ever thought of that.

The little boys, harvesting their squash, carrots, beets, wondered at the apathy of their mother. Other years she had gaily assisted them. “Love and work,” her husband had said, but work without the love was another thing. Now Myra’s letter had roused her from her gloom. She still had love – love for her children. The possibility of losing one lashed her into a realization of her position. She and the children would have to fight for their existence.

It was Christmas Eve, and Delia had made a brave attempt at cheer with pumpkin pies and red apples twined with desert holly.

“Mama,” cried Richard excitedly, “the rooster’s come.”

Delia went out to admire chanticleer who was in fine feather. She exclaimed over his burnished copper color, and Richard was as proud of him as if he had been a peacock. She had got the Rhode Island Red cockerel for the boy’s Christmas present because the suit she had made over for him looked so hopelessly home-made.

“When are you going to make the gingerbread men?” asked little Rob, when the bird had been penned up with the other chickens.

“Right now, son,” and Mrs. Davis hurried to her sunny kitchen. These gray winter days were short and she had much to do. She rolled out the gingerbread men – some stout, some lean, but all with currant eyes, while Rob watched her, fascinated. Then she cut out a cow for Jack, a sheep for Dick, and, to his huge delight, a pig for Rob.

“Brother Anderson is at the gate, mother,” said Jack as he came in early for his milk bucket.

She opened the door for the bishop’s counselor, a cheery, broad-shouldered man who deposited a box upon the table.

“I guess it isn’t a very Merry Christmas for you, Sister Davis.” He shook hands with her gravely.

“No, it isn’t.” Tears welled in her eyes. “It seems like I never can reconcile myself to John’s death – struck down in his full strength and manhood.”

“I’ll have to tell you what I heard a man say the other day,” he said. “The world war has sent millions of souls to the spirit world and many missionaries are needed to preach to them there. That is why this epidemic singles out the young and the strong. Brother Davis, pure, manly, experienced, at his prime, would make an ideal missionary.”

“But wasn’t is mission here with his children?”

“No, your mission is with them, and you will have to discharge it faithfully to meet him and be worthy of him in the hereafter.”

Somehow the words comforted her. John had always wanted to go on a mission, and this was probably more glorious than any earth mission could be, but she only murmured, “I feel my weakness.”

“I have found, Sister Davis, that when the Lord requires a task at our hands, he gives us the strength to perform it, and, furthermore, he often opens up unexpected ways in which to accomplish his purposes.”

“How many acres are there in that plowed field over there?” he asked suddenly.

“About twelve, I believe. John plowed it early last fall when he was working night shift.”

“Why don’t you let us plant it to sugar beets?” Mr. Anderson was the local representative of the sugar beet factory. “We would do the planting and send a man to help the boys weed and thin the beets. With judicious irrigating and your good ditches you ought to raise thirteen tons to the acre. The expenses can be taken out of the crop and it won’t cost you a cent.”

Her heart leaped. That was the answer. Raise sugar beets! If she could weather the next year or two, she felt that she could go on. In her mind’s eye she saw the brown field verdant with sugar beets with their potential wealth of sweetness; the industry that will transform waste land into the most profitable of investments.

“All right,” she said, “I believe I will.”

She thanked him for the Christmas box and he took his departure. He had other calls to make. She found a quantity of canned goods and a basket o oranges. it was the Ward’s gifts to its widows, and was bestowed on them irrespective of whether they were rich or poor.

That night, after popping corn, the boys retired precipitately to allow Santa Claus to come. The mother stole in and gazed at the three handsome heads upon the pillows. No need to part with one of them. By raising sugar beets she could support all her children. Myra had her big house, her rugs, soft lights and silver; her afternoon teas and her limousine; her opera and her husband. She had only her sons, yet she felt that John had left her rich. She pushed back the dark hair and kissed the white brow.

“I think I will keep you, my Richard, as a Christmas present to myself.”

She tiptoed out to the sitting room to arrange the brave little Christmas. There were ice skates and a sweater for Jack; a pocket knife (he was always losing them), and the funny little suit for Dick; red mittens and a toy aeroplane for Rob. he had watched the mail planes fly overhead and he had been quite firm about the “airplane.”

As Mrs. Davis filled the stockings she indulged in those most wonderful of day dreams – a mother’s hopes for her children. her industrious Jack should learn thrift and work. he should go to the agricultural college and become a scientific farmer. Richard, instead of his beloved rabbits and chickens, would raise sheep or cattle. he could raise cattle right around the home place. Perhaps eventually he would own a bank like Uncle Samuel’s. Mrs. Davis noticed that most of the banks, office buildings and apartment houses, in the Lake City, were owned by men who had gone out and done rough, disagreeable work – mines ,sheep men, cattle men. Little Rob, who would cry for an “aeroplane”while eating bread and jam, perhaps would become the great engineer that his father had dreamed of being.

-oOo-

Christmas day was ushered in with a snowstorm from the northwest. To Windrift, on the wings of the storm, came that greatest of all gifts – a soul from the Infinite. You see, the new baby couldn’t possibly have taken the place of Richard, because it was a girl.