Spring in the Deep River valley began with trilliums in mid-March. By late April it brought longing, and Ilmari convinced Aino to move temporarily into Ullakko’s house so he could go find a bride. He figured it would take him ten days, maximum.
Aino had raised hell, pointing out that she was perfectly capable of being alone, she’d had enough of being someone’s live-in servant in Finland, and it looked very much like the opening move toward an arranged marriage with which she forcefully disagreed. Ilmari in turn argued forcefully that it was in no way the opening move in an arranged marriage and that young women all over America worked for people and boarded with them. What was not argued but was well known to all was that when Ilmari came back with his bride, Aino would be redundant.
When the storm subsided, the rock on the shore had remained unmoved and Ilmari helped Aino move to Ullakko’s.
Ullakko had made a platform bed for her in the girls’ room and had given up his own mattress for it. She was touched. Being above the kitchen, the girls’ room had the double advantage of the heat from the floor and the sheet metal chimney. Aino liked the prospect of sharing the room with the girls. She loved her brothers dearly, but they weren’t sisters.
Ilmari walked to Willapa Bay and caught the Reliable to Willapa where he spent the night. The next morning in a hard rain he took a second boat out to sea then back across the roiling bar at the mouth of Grays Harbor and into Nordland, dark against the gray sky in the gloom of late afternoon.
A few streets were paved with sawdust and straw. The rest were mud. The buildings within several blocks of the waterfront were built on pilings. Having arrived at low tide, Ilmari could smell the excrement and garbage lying in the mud beneath the buildings. When the tide came in, most of the excrement and garbage was washed out to the river and then down to the sea—most of it.
He settled in a rooming house on Herron Street, the room just big enough for a single bed. He whittled until there was no light.
He was up at dawn. The meeting was to be at three, so he spent the morning looking at all the merchandise in the stores. At one, he rubbed brilliantine into his hair and combed it in front of the single round mirror hanging next to the two-hole privy that opened over the river below. Then he stood on the boardwalk outside the hotel for over an hour, occasionally going back to recomb his hair. It wasn’t like going to a dance.
Louhi Jokinen was in her office at the Tannika House, a brothel in which she held 51 percent. She also was getting ready to leave for the meeting, but she had a problem: Al Drummond lying on her office couch snoozing off a heavy lunch and too much alcohol. Drummond, the owner of the First National Bank of Nordland, was the 49 percent partner. In addition to being a ruthless businessman and an all-around son of a bitch, he was a snoop and Louhi couldn’t leave him there alone. He could, however, be childishly belligerent if disturbed. She decided to wake him anyway. She had been handling belligerent men since her parents died when she was fourteen and she took up hooking in Seattle to feed herself.
She shook Al’s shoulder and he grunted to low-level consciousness. “It’s nearly three,” Louhi said. “I’m worried someone might be missing you over at the bank.”
Drummond reached up for her, smiling sleepily. “Ah, come on Louhi. Give me a kiss.”
She turned her back and went for her coat. A small gat-toothed woman, curvy in all the right places, she could still hold a man’s eye although she was no longer young. Her physical appearance combined with a force of personality forged by triumphing over many hard years could attract a strong man and scare the hell out of a weak one. “Come on, Al. If you’re horny, go over to the Tannika and pay for it.”
“Ahh, Louhi. How unkind.”
She shrugged into her long, dark-blue wool coat with a rich chocolate mink collar. “I’ve got a visitor over at the house at three and you’ve got a reputation to keep.” She paused. “Or at least keep from getting worse.” She smiled to let him know she was kidding him. She, however, wasn’t kidding. “Come on. If your wife shows up at the bank, there’ll be hell to pay.”
Drummond sighed and attempted a kiss, deftly avoided. He left the office saying, “Work, work, work. That’s all I do.” She had to smile. He wasn’t without a sense of humor.
When Louhi reached home, she shouted for Rauha to bring her best shoes. She took the clothes brush by the door and began brushing the mud off the hem of her skirt. It left the hem slightly darker with the dampness, but she realized she wouldn’t have time to change, and it would have to do. She put her muddy shoes on a low rack in the foyer and went into the parlor just as Rauha came down the stairs.
Louhi sat on the couch, putting on her good shoes while inspecting Rauha, who had seated herself opposite her. Louhi took in the very discreet lip coloring and rouge on Rauha’s nearly perfect face and fair skin. She had put her blond hair up but allowed a tendril to dangle down on each side.
“The tendrils are a good idea,” Louhi said. Rauha touched one of them and gave a quick nervous smile. “Now get that goddamned color off your lips. He’ll think you work at the Tannika.”
Pressing and licking her lips to comply with her mother’s order, but still leave some color, she asked, “Does he know about the Tannika?”
“If not, he’ll know soon enough,” Louhi muttered, feeling her corset as she tied her shoes. She sat up straight and took a breath.
“Sigrid married an American,” Rauha said.
Louhi focused her dark eyes on her daughter, giving her an I’ll-brook-no-nonsense look. “American be damned. You’re going to marry someone respectable, not one of my customers. I’ve asked around and he’s an honest hard worker, lives clean, and comes from my home place. He also lives two days away, where what I do for a living won’t be thrown in your face. You’ll never marry anyone of any standing here.”
She watched her daughter bite her lip. No use hiding facts, even hard ones.
“You know she’s pregnant,” Rauha muttered. Louhi could see Rauha wasn’t over her little sister’s marrying before her.
“Is that supposed to surprise me?”
Rauha studied her neatly filed, short fingernails.
Louhi stood, straightening her skirt. She put her hand under Rauha’s chin to make her look up. “She’ll be crawling back home within two years with a baby, no waistline, and a man about as stable as a Siwash canoe.”
Rauha started to turn away, but Louhi turned her face back and looked fiercely into her eyes. “I’ll be goddamned if you go down the path of your sister. Or me.”
Rauha turned her head and walked over to the window. “He’s here,” she said quietly.
Louhi greeted Ilmari in Finnish at the door, leaving Rauha sitting in the parlor, as was appropriate. She quickly examined how he was dressed. He wore shoes not work boots and a wool suit jacket and tie. The sleeves of the jacket were about an inch too high on the wrists, most likely, she mused, because these were the Sunday clothes he’d brought from Finland when still in his teens. Likely the coat was so little used he hadn’t bothered to alter it. She liked the looks of him, strong, thick chest, good posture, darker than most Finns, and with thick black hair.
Ilmari entered the house awkwardly. He started to put his hand out to shake hers but quickly withdrew it, not knowing whether it was polite to shake a lady’s hand. Smiling to herself, she thought, I can at least look like a lady. She led him into the parlor.
Rauha stood and smiled. Even though Finns were harder to read than Indians, Louhi had made thousands of introductions between men and women and could tell instantly if she’d correctly connected buyer and product. Ilmari’s eyes darted right down to Rauha’s shoes. Shy. Louhi watched him struggle between wanting to stare at Rauha and being polite. Clearly, Rauha could have him; the question was would she.
Aware that he shouldn’t stare, Ilmari tried to look at the cup as he placed it in the saucer. He failed and once again his gaze strayed to Rauha’s ankles. Then he looked up to avoid staring at them only to rest on the outline of her thighs. He quickly moved his eyes upward, trying to avoid looking at her breasts, until he made eye contact. Jerking his eyes to his coffee cup, he began the eye journey anew. Such beauty and a hard worker, too. He wanted to throw the coffee cup at the wall and start dancing. He wanted to propose to Rauha on the spot. He’d seen pictures of women like Rauha in newspapers advertising soap and clothes, and in drawings of Gibson girls on bunkhouse walls, but he had never seen a woman as beautiful as Rauha in the flesh, just feet away from him. He could smell perfume but wasn’t sure if it was Rauha’s or her mother’s. He was acutely aware of the way Rauha’s breasts moved when she breathed.
“I play the kantele,” he blurted out.
Rauha smiled at him. “That’s nice.”
He couldn’t think of what to say after that.
“I hear you are a blacksmith.”
Ilmari nodded his head. “Yoh.”
Rauha gave her mother a look. This prompted Ilmari to add, “I can make things from iron … that people buy.”
As efficiently as bankers making a loan, Rauha and Louhi learned every detail, from the number of rooms in his house to the number, productivity, and age of his cattle to the amount of furniture he owned and whether it was store-bought or homemade.
After Ilmari left, they sat in silence. Then Louhi said, “He’s got good timber and land.”
“He’s also the only blacksmith around Tapiola. The logging and sawmills will make it a growing cash business.”
“I agree,” Louhi said. It felt good to see herself in Rauha. “I’ve asked him back. I think he’s it, but we’ll make it clear there’ll be no betrothal until at least fall.”
Rauha gave her a questioning look.
“The longer they wait, the longer they stick,” Louhi said.