The Red Book Magazine/Volume 27/Number 2/Built Upon a Rock

HIS is the story of a house on the river flats of Minneapolis. The flats are at the foot of the bluff which flanks the Mississippi and lie downstream from where the blank walls of grain elevators rise like fortresses. The district is roughly bounded by two long-legged bridges which step from bluff to bluff in prodigious strides. Many houses squat down there, homes of poor people, erected at little cost and possible for their occupants solely because to secure the land on which they set, it is necessary to bargain only with the River.

During the greater portion of the year the stream flows swiftly along and does not bother the people who live on terrain which by the law of might belongs to it. But occasionally, when choked by spring ice, the current rises to break impeding jams, and then the water backs up over the flats, exercising its seigniority.

The houses are huddled closely together, probably because the Bohemians who first squatted there were frugal of land even though it cost them nothing; but a fanciful visitor might see in the crowding a conscious recognition of the River's threat. They are built mostly of materials which have rendered service elsewhere, and around each house is a picket fence, made mostly of boards salvaged at flood-time. The planks that suffice for walks in the meager yards are always clean-swept, and washings are ever hanging on patched-up clothes lines. Cleanliness and thrift seem to be characteristic of the neighborhood.

There are no streets, just lanes, with swept paths for sidewalks. The ways up and down are little more than zigzagging trails, and few outsiders invade the flats. But when one does, the children—there are many—call, “Who you lookin' for, Mister?” and the dogs—there are many—bark furiously, and the women—mostly Slovak now—who seem to spend much time about the public hydrants with kerchiefs over their heads and buckets on their arms, eye him furtively and talk.

The people there are apart from the city which makes noises overhead. They have their ducks and their pigeons and their children and their church—a yellow, square one—and their troubles and homes all to themselves, and are rather indifferent to the River except when it invades their property. Then they scramble up the bluff with their portable belongings and wait until the water recedes, when stoically they clean up again and resume their wonted ways. Sometimes they lose heavily, but they accept the risk, because were it not for the cheapness of the places down there, they would, it is likely, be living huddled somewhere up dark stairways.

That was why Joe and Mary Tomek bought a house on the flats. Joe had been only eight months in America when he first beheld Mary. A friend had written him to “go see my cousin, Paul Havlicek, who has a big shop;” and Joe went and found Paul to be the proprietor of a small and smelly grocery, over which he lived. The four rooms accommodated Paul, his wife, their three children and three boarders. Mary, who worked in the woolen mills, was one of the boarders.

Paul was glad to see Joe; and Joe was glad to see—Mary. She had hair that glinted red, and gray eyes, and the delectable plumpness of nineteen. Mary was glad to see Joe too, for she was at that pause in her development which is neither homesickness nor deep interest in the new environment. With Joe she found the kinship of like birth and manner, and she approved his shyness and could sympathize with his bewilderment in this country, for she had, not so long ago, been similarly confused herself.

But even Joe's timidity could not keep him from Paul's after that first visit. He was a simple fellow with simple wants, but, perhaps because of this, his desire was tremendous. He and Mary had no privacy in the rooms over the grocery, and so they did not talk much at first, but there was need of neither seclusion nor words to make the girl understand what was proceeding in her suitor's heart. His eyes disclosed enough.

Later, when they had decided to be married, they talked. Joe retained all his native ideals and ambitions and after he was sure of Mary, he wanted a home more than anything else. Not this!—with a grimace at the cluttered room—but a house with a yard, and ducks.

ARY thought this fine, but it was too bad things cost so! A lot was impossible, let alone a house. She had known a girl, though, whose folks had lived down on the flats, and they had kept ducks. This recollection resulted in a solution of their problem, and they arranged to buy for a trifle a vacant house under a poplar tree in the row nearest the River.

The house had three rooms, five windows and a door. In May they moved in, and straightway put a duck on a setting of eggs. Evenings they could sit on their tiny porch and hear the River, down away from the city, whose nearness was unconvincing after they got used to the muffled rumble of the bridges. It was Joe's ideal of happiness, the old-country ideal. They were settled.

And that was just the trouble. Mary, though she had not suspected it, was not ready to settle; she was far enough along in American ways for that. Being married interested her until the experience descended to the routine of housework and quiet evenings and waiting for babies; and then she commenced to think of girls she had known in the mill who had married, and wondered what they were doing. Some, she knew, were having a fine time, a better time than she was having. Mary was infected with an ambition to better herself, and the stability and sense of finality of life here on the flats depressed her.

She wanted to go back to work, she said. Joe was so astonished at first that he could not understand, and when he did realize, he was mildly angry; but Mary's sullen front weakened his assurance, and before her growing rebellion he became helpless. She would not live always in a shanty; she would not have babies; she would not miss all that other girls were having.

“But, Mary!”—alarmed. “You got a home. What else you want, Mary?”

Home! Having a house did not make a home! She wanted a better house, wanted him to be sweller. No place was a real home unless you had a good time in it.

“We got ducks, Mary, and firewood. I got a good job!”

Well, she was just tired—staying here, never doing anything, She was going back to work.

In his distress some of the old timidity came back in his eyes. That look made Mary uneasy; she felt guilty because she had hurt him, and so she said no more. Only once again was the matter mentioned, then by Joe, who looked up from his plate and said:

“I got a good job, and the house is paid for. I stay home every night, don't I, Mary?”

She did not reply, but when he came home the next night she was not there.

Joe ate no supper the first night Mary was not there, but sat down in the kitchen and waited until long after bed-time—he lighted his pipe and went to sleep in his chair because he wanted to be up when Mary came back.

The next night he sat up also, but the third he had to go to bed. He left a light burning, though. It was unthinkable that Mary was gone for long.

For two Sundays Joe did not go to church, because he wanted to be home to welcome Mary—if she came. His third absence was for a different reason. The priest came to see him one night, and said Mary must be prayed for because she was wicked. Joe drove the priest out. Mary was not to blame, he shouted. Blame him! The house was only a shanty—the best he could get for Mary, but a shanty, nothing more.

All through the winter nights the light burned in Joe's house; he kept the paths clear of snow and fed the ducks. He had been unable to make a real home for Mary, and a home was all any girl could want. Some time she would come back, and all he could do for her meanwhile was to keep this house, the best he could offer. He bought some lumber and built a new woodshed. Mary had wanted a woodshed from the first. When she came back, it might please her.

Winter passed. It was no longer dark when Joe cooked his own supper; the cascades of ice on the bluffs melted; it rained heavily—and the River commenced to mutter. Then Joe came home one night to find the water within a foot of his fence.

“You better be ready to move out,” the neighbors warned him. “The water may be in your house before morning.”

In his house? Water? What if Mary should come home and find the house full of water?

E did not go to work the next day, but stayed at home and watched the River, which had invaded his yard. Out in the channel floes of swirling gray ice swept past. It began to rain again shortly after daylight; the patches of snow shrank; the River broadened.

At noon Joe sat by his stove and watched a stain of water creep under the door. He got the broom and swept it back, but it came again; and though he swept faster, it kept coming. The people next door, wading knee-deep, carried bedding to the bluff and shouted to Joe that he had better hurry, but he gave no heed.

An hour later a policeman in hip-boots sloshed up to Joe's front gate.

“You better beat it,” he said. “This's the worst ever; she's risin' fast.”

“After a while, mebby,” Joe replied.

He took the ducks out of their pen end put them in the woodshed. By dusk the kitchen floor was ankle-deep in water, and the flow was so decided that it gurgled through his fence-pickets. The current had set in toward the flat as ice piled up in midstream below, and gray cakes floated over land that yesterday had been dry. In the gloom the flickers of foam looked like gleams from ghost eyes, and the River growl had become a roar.

Joe put some more wood in the stove. The ash-pit was soaked, but the fire-box was still above water, and the draw of the chimney and the singing of the kettle made a comforting contrast with the other sounds. Keeping up the fire was a gesture, a whistling in the dark. Mary's home was in danger; there was nothing much he could do.

He saw the first cake of ice graze his fence. One of the planks that had served as a walk to the gate suddenly appeared on the surface and swung about, lodging against the woodshed. The imprisoned ducks protested.

Something snapped, and Joe ran out, almost falling in his excitement. A floe had bumped against his fence and was heaving heavily as the current tried to force it through. Another was swept against it and again a picket snapped. Joe picked up a pole and shoved on them, berating them aloud, but his effort availed nothing, because the flood was to his waist, and it required most of his strength even to stand upright in it. A rolling tree-top came along and joined the ice-cakes, and a moment later the fence gave way, and the tangle swept past Joe. He shouted at it and waded against the stream to see how badly his fence had been damaged. Swept from his feet, he gasped at the chill of the water; and before he could get up, another section of his fence was ripped away.

Ice shivered itself to bits against the bridge-piers, and the River roared savagely.

Joe saw a big cake swept in still closer to his house, swiftly, as though with conscious intent, and he floundered toward it and braced himself and pushed, but it thrust him aside as he struck at it, bumping into a corner of the house, hesitating, swinging off and carrying away one of the timbers that supported the porch roof. The roof sagged and cracked, and Joe fell upon the next advancing ice and beat it with his fists. It too struck the house, and he saw sparks shoot out of the chimney. The little building moved and creaked; a corner settled noticeably and something inside fell with a splash and a thump.

Crying, Joe faced upstream. The house that he had kept for Mary was being destroyed before his eyes, and he shook his fist at the River and stripped back a sleeve and braced himself to fight the flood with his hands..... When, later, they came toward him with a lantern, he tried to fight the police too, but he was dragged up the bluff and pushed into the patrol wagon.

HAT you got there?” the desk sergeant asked when they led Joe into the station.

“He was tryin' to save his house,” one of the officers replied. “Had to drag him out. Look at his mitts, all bleedin' with hittin' the ice!” He winked and stuck his tongue in his cheek. “I dunno what to do with him; where's the old man?”

“In there.” The sergeant nodded at a closed door. “Hogan brought in a skirt. Captain's givin' her a heart-to-heart.”

“Sit over there, Joe,” the officer said. “I got to get on some dry pants.”

Joe moved listlessly over to the bench and sat down. His hat was gone and his hair was soaked. He leaned forward and stared at his hands and muttered.

“What's that, Joe?” the sergeant asked.

Joe straightened.

“Mary's house,” he began, just as that closed door opened and the captain came out behind a pale girl who had been crying. “Mary's house.....I couldn't keep it for her. When she comes home she wont have no house.” He held up his hands. “An' I built a woodshed for her—to make it a better house.”

HE girl ran to him and dropped on her knees. “Joe! ” she cried; “Joe, what you done? You—”

“Mary!” He pressed his palms to her cheeks and shook his big head as though to clear it. “Mary ..... I tried, but your home, it's gone in the River. I—I tried to keep it for you, when you come back, Mary. But now—” He drew away from her, and his voice shook. “Now we aint got no home—and you wont never come back.”

“You wanted me back, Joe? After I went away? After I've been—”

She lapsed into Bohemian then, sitting back on her heels, her hands limp at her sides.

“Anyway,” he told her, “I wanted you back—any way. But now it's gone. I aint got nothing for you.”

She leaned forward, a hand on his knee.

“Yes, you have, Joe. I got a room. You can make a room a home, Joe. You don't need a house to have a home. You don't need nothing but—”

She flung her arms about him, sobbing like a little frightened girl, and his battered hands stroked her hair fiercely, but gently.