THE BRIDE OF ARNE SANDSTROM
Time, 1885
“Big Swede wedding over there this evening,” said one passer to another by his side. “Peter Lund’s daughter.”
“Is she marrying a Swede?” inquired the second.
“Yes; fellow by the name of Arne Sandstrom.”
“I should think old Peter, well off as he is, would have looked higher for a son-in-law—you or me, for instance,” observed the second youth, with a laugh.
“The girl’s pretty as a pink, and has had every advantage. It is a pity to see her thrown away; but old Peter has a lot of younger ones coming on.”
“That makes it less an object. I thought she was his only. The Swedes are clannish.”
“Peter Lund’s is headquarters for them, too. Here’s one now, hunting up the wedding. I’ll bet she’s just arrived from the old country.”
So near the truth was this surmise that Elsa had been off the train only twenty minutes, and in that time had repeated the name of Arne Sandstrom interrogatively to every person she met. She was dazed by long riding and partial fasting, and the dumb terror of finding no one to receive her at the end of her great journey. The letter created with much brain-work to announce her coming ought to have been in his hands weeks ago. The innocent and friendless soul did not know she had omitted all dates and exactness in her general care for spelling and inky loops. So stepping off the train into the American town at dusk, she saw stretches of summer prairie to the westward, perky architecture, crossing railroad tracks, hurrying citizens, and lazy loungers—even the new electric light on its spider-work iron tower beginning to make a ghastly powerful star far above her head. She saw baggage and piles of express matter, hotel runners, and other women, starting toward their assured homes, tucked laughing and chatting under their husbands’ arms; but she saw not one face or one kind hand ready to bid her welcome, who had ventured thousands of miles alone—across ocean, across continent—to marry her betrothed lover, Arne Sandstrom.
Hearing his name spoken, she stood still upon the sidewalk, shrinking and timid, but directly in front of the young men, and inquired, using hands and eyes as well as anxious inflection of voice, “Arne Sandstrom?”
“She wants to know where Arne Sandstrom is. Right over there—that big house, which you see lighted up. She doesn’t understand. Arne Sandstrom over there. Getting married! Yes, yes. Arne Sandstrom. Here, Jack, you trot out a little Swedish, can’t you? You’ve been among them more than I have.”
“Arne Sandstrom derover,” exclaimed the other, pointing to Peter Lund’s house, with a fine assumption of handling the language well. “Arne Sandstrom jifta to-night, you know.”
“Yifta!” said Elsa, shrinking down in stature.
“She’s got hold of it. That’s all right. You’ll be in time for the wedding.”
“She didn’t understand; she thought we were making fun of her,” said one of the lads as they sauntered on.
“She did understand, and there she goes straight across the street. Brush up in the languages, young man, and make yourself as useful to the public as I am.”
When Elsa had entered the Lund premises, however, she did not ring the bell, but wavered around the house, looking up at lighted windows, and shifting her little bundle from one arm to the other. She had other baggage at the station, but it seemed no longer worth while. There was a western veranda, on the lowest step of which she sat down in quiet stupor to collect herself for some determined movement.
Anguish and disappointment must be the natural lot in this world, only she had not lived enough years to find it out before. Though summer darkness had come, the after-glow was still so bright in the west that it half quarreled with abundant lamplight. Elsa could hear the front gate, the crunch of coming footsteps, and frequent peals of the door-bell, as she sat drawn together, and the eternal minutes traveled on.
Peter Lund’s house was full of joyful stir. China and silver tinkled in the open dining-room, where several women were putting last touches to the tables. Girls flew up and down the back stairway, calling to one another in Swedish.
“One thing is sure, Yennie Yonsen,” called a voice in the home tongue, “there will not be enough married women to take the bride from us girls in the wedding dance; so now what will Arne Sandstrom do?”
Three of them conspired together by the western dining-room door, bobbing their flaxen heads, all laughing and talking at once in their light happiness, far above the unseen stranger on the step.
“Who told me Arne Sandstrom left a betrothed girl in Svadia?” said one, lowering her voice to graver colloquy.
“Oh, well, she married, herself, of course,” replied another; “and any man who could get Lena Lund would take her.”
“Lena’s so pretty.”
“Lena’s rich.”
“Lena can sing and play better than some Amerikanskä.”
“Lena has ten new dresses. Arne will not have to put his hand in his pocket for many a day.”
“She is not spoiled therewith. I always liked her.”
“Ah, my mother said if this wedding was going to be in Svadia this St. John’s Eve, what a night we would make of it!”
They ran away, while Elsa repeated to herself that this was the Eve of St. John—night of arbors and rejoicing at home, night when the sun scarcely went down, and everybody feasted and visited under green-leaf tents. Of what use was St. John’s Eve, or any other portion of time, to a girl put to shame and despair as she was? Why had Arne Sandstrom sent her money to come over with if he meant to jilt her on her arrival? Or had he picked another betrothed for her as well as himself? She would not believe her Arne could be so evil; she would knock and ask for him. He was so kind! he loved her. Yet not only the Amerikanns, but those laughing girls, had said plainly this was Arne Sandstrom’s wedding; any man would take Lena Lund who could get her; Lena was so pretty; Lena was rich; Lena could sing and play better than some Amerikanskä; Lena had ten new dresses, and she was not spoiled.
Elsa bruised her cheek against the edge of the second step above her. She did not know where to go, and her money was all spent except the little she had saved by going without food during part of her railway journey, and she had saved that to buy some little ornament for her new home with Arne. She might try to hire herself out, but how could she ever write back home where such happy news was expected from her, or how could she put unendurable anxiety upon those best friends by not writing at all? Svadia was so pleasant, especially in the long nightless summers. Good and kind they were to strangers there: her mother always baked waffles and carried them with coffee to the morning bedside of a guest. She could see her native meadows stretching away in the blue northern air, and the iron whip, as her mother called the scythe, beating up an appetite in those who wielded it, while she herself, a careless little maid, came bearing the second breakfast to the mowers.
A quavering but hearty voice, which might have come from the mouth of her own grandmother if it had not belonged to Peter Lund’s mother, sung out a Lapp-Finn nurse song by an upper window, and Elsa knew just what syllables the dancing baby was made to emphasize.
“Donsa lupon,
Hopsom tup an,
Lanti lira,
Hopsom stira:
Sprönti lupon, lupon,
Hopsom tup an, tup an,
Lanti lira, lira,
Hopsom stira, stira.”
Dance and jump,
Hop like a rooster,
Hop like the skatan.
Perhaps this very instant—for Elsa made no calculations in longitude and time—vader’s mütter danced the baby under her home roof; and none of her people knew how faint, how outcast, how bewildered the eldest child felt sitting on steps in a strange Amerikanski town.
In Elsa’s box of clothing was the finest sheepskin blanket her mother ever made, so white in fleece, and cured by buttering and scraping until the skin yielded soft like chamois leather. It was lined with scarlet flannel. She could see the storeroom of her father’s farmhouse hung thickly with such fleeces, and hear her mother say she wished Elsa could take more, since they had so little money to send with her. But Arne Sandstrom had sent the money to pay her way, because he loved her so. They were children together, and he was held as dear as a son in her own family. Elsa’s mother never distrusted him. How could it therefore be possible that Arne Sandstrom, after sending for his betrothed, could be marrying a Swede Amerikanskä fleka the very evening of her arrival?
In her intensely quiet fashion the poor girl was wiping away tears as fast as they dripped down her cheeks, and now she lifted her head from the step, coming to a decision.
She walked up on the veranda, her feet sounding heavy and uncertain, and stood at the door ready to knock. Her piteous great eyes moved from wall to wall of the ample dining-room, recognizing Svensk wooden spoons and beautifully painted and polished Russian bowls in various sizes on the side-board. Hard-baked Svensk bread, so loved by the white and firm Scandinavian teeth, and all known home luxuries, with unheard-of Amerikanski things, smiled at her from the glittering tables. This Lena Lund would be called a mamzelle in Svadia; she was very much above a poor yungfrau like Elsa. Any man might be glad to marry her. Still Elsa would not believe Arne Sandstrom had forgotten his betrothed.
She could see him from where she stood, in an inner room with a background of fine furniture. How beautiful he looked, all in Amerikann clothes, and with soft dark gloves on his hands, like a very rich man! His cheek was ruddy, his forehead white, and the very round of his ear—how well Elsa remembered it! Arne Sandstrom was happy, and laughing aloud with other people. She heard his voice while she stood just without, so wretched her whole soul seemed numb.
In perfect silence she waited, and still saw him laugh and extend his hand to have it shaken by one and another, until a figure came out of the room where he was, to pass through the dining-room, and she knew in an instant Otto Jutberg, who came to America with Arne. Elsa put her foot across the threshold and said, to call his attention, “Otto.”
Otto approached the door and looked curiously at her. One rope of her flaxen hair hung down on her breast, and she looked travel-worn.
“Otto Jutberg, I want to see Arne Sandstrom.”
“Arne is going to be married in a few minutes,” said Otto.
“I know he is. But I want to see Arne Sandstrom. Tell him to come here.”
“Who is it?” pressed Otto, coming nearer to her, and knitting his brows inquiringly.
“Don’t you know me, Otto, when you have been to my father’s nearly every St. John’s Eve of our lives?”
Elsa felt that she needed only one more drop to her cup, and that for some voice to raise the derisive song with which her countrymen mocked Scowneys, or inhabitants of a region the butt of all Svadia.
“A Scowen, a Scowen”—
one bar was enough to rouse sudden rage in any Svensk.
But instead of “A Scowen, a Scowen,” rising around Elsa’s ears this enchanted night, such a din of outcries was made by Otto Jutberg that people ran to look into the dining-room, and then to swarm around her.
Arne Sandstrom leaped two chairs and seriously jarred one table, to receive Elsa in his arms, when he kissed her openly.
“Bring me one of the chairs I kicked over,” he exclaimed, “and let me set the tired darling in it. I have been looking for the letter which would tell me when you intended to start. Yes, this is my Elsa,” he announced, displaying her; “and how did she find her way in here alone? Mrs. Lund, Elsa has come!”
“Yes, and she has been crying,” said the plump wife of Peter Lund, pressing her hand. “It was enough to break any child’s heart to reach such a journey’s end homesick and unwelcomed.”
At this Elsa leaned against the matron’s side, and shook with sudden sobs, feeling her forehead and hair petted by a good mother’s palms.
Elsa was taken upstairs by both Mrs. Lund and Arne, who talked rapidly across her. She was put into a beautiful room, and young girls came to get acquainted with her. Arne asked her for that piece of metal which would redeem her baggage, and he handed it over to Otto at the door. Before she understood her position, or was quite able to lift her eyes and look at all who wanted to talk to her, the box which had borne her company from Svadia was brought in, and Arne told her the other wedding would be put off half an hour while she got ready. Then he drove the merry company out of the room, and stood with his back to the door to keep at bay that moment all volunteering bride attendants.
“Can you be ready in half an hour, after your long journey, my darling?” said he.
“I can soon wash off the dust and change my dress,” said Elsa. “But, Arne, I do not know anything. Who is going to marry Lena Lund?”
“Arne Sandstrom. And you will be married at the same time.”
“I thought that was what you and Mrs. Lund said. But who is going to marry me?”
“Who! I am—Arne Sandstrom.”
“I will not do it,” said Elsa. “They never have two wives in Svadia.”
Arne Sandstrom gazed silently at her, puffed and exploded his cheeks, and bent over, striking his knees with those delicately gloved hands Elsa had first noted with such awe. He roared in the fervor of his laughter. This American country had in no way abated Arne Sandstrom as a Norseman.
“Oh, Elsa, my snowbird, if I should tell this on thee they would laugh at thee from one end of town to the other. Lena Lund’s bridegroom is my cousin Arne, that came over with Otto Jutberg and me.”
“That was Arne Peterssen,” affirmed Elsa.
“But there are so many Peterssens and Yonsens who take their names from their fathers’ Christian names that Arne changed his to Sandstrom. It is a very common thing to do here.”
Elsa laughed also. It was so simple and clear and Swedish she wondered that news of Arne Sandstrom’s wedding had caused her even a misgiving. She left her chair to swing Arne’s hands while they both finished laughing.
“But you ought to be ready,” he cried, “and not keep the others waiting. I got the papers for the wedding when Arne got his papers, so there would be no mistake of names on the record, and so I could marry you as soon as you came.”
Within the hour, therefore, Elsa was the bride of Arne Sandstrom, arrayed in her dark blue wedding dress of wool, and not shaming by her statue-like proportions and fairness the lighter prettiness and silken raiment of Arne Sandstrom’s American Swedish bride. Happiness and love were, after all, the natural lot in this world, thought Elsa, sitting by her husband in her place of honor at the wedding supper, and tasting the first course of such a feast—the Swedish soup of rice, prunes, raisins, and molasses.