‘Ve vill yust put anoder cup of vater in the soup,’ said Mrs. Bjornsen, which she did.
But when, after a week, the second camouflage-brindle, two-ton truck didn’t arrive with the parts, the Bjornsens arranged for the lone American soldier to move in with the Wasyl Lakustas, who were known as the Lakustas by the lake, although Lily Lake, the lake they lived by, had dried up years earlier.
The lone American soldier was both willing and able to pay for board and room, while the Wasyl Lakustas were known (a) to be so poor their children took bacon-fat sandwiches to school, when they went to school, which was infrequently, and (b) to have two eligible daughters, at least one of whom was rumored to be hot-blooded.
Now the lone American soldier, who had a name, but who everybody, which at this point was only the eleven Bjornsens, referred to as the Little American Soldier, because of his size, which was negligible, the Little American Soldier took an immediate shine to Lavonia Lakusta who was seventeen, had dark red hair and brown eyes, and was rumored to be the hot-blooded one among the Lakusta sisters.
Two more weeks passed, and the Little American Soldier walked from the Lakustas by the lake to Bjornsen’s Corner and again used the phone to call his superiors and inquire about the missing truck parts. The United States Army told the Little American Soldier to be patient, that they hadn’t forgotten about him, that they had ordered parts for his camouflage-brindle, two-ton truck from Michigan or Minnesota or wherever, and that they had tracked down the approximate location of Sven Bjornsen’s telephone, and that it wasn’t anywhere near where the Little American Soldier was supposed to be, but since he was liable to be there for a spell, a spell being a unit of time that both the Little American Soldier and the United States Army understood, it was agreed that his pay would be sent to the post office at Fark, which was the closest post office to Bjornsen’s Corner, a place which the United States Army said didn’t exist. In the meantime, several of the eleven Bjornsens had towed the Little American Soldier’s camouflage-brindle, two-ton truck into their yard and parked it in their machine shed.
Wasyl Lakusta, of the Lakustas by the lake, thinking of his old age, recognized good solid son-in-law material when he saw it, and did what he could to promote a match between the Little American Soldier and his daughter, Lavonia. Promoting the match mainly involved showing off Lavonia’s cooking and showing off Lavonia. The oldest Lakusta girl, Sylvie, who was nineteen, took after her mother, and was as Wasyl Lakusta described her, ‘Not much good for look at, but pretty much good for strong.’
Wasyl wasn’t worried about finding a husband for Sylvie, one of the Yaremko boys from Stanger had already shown an interest, a large-bodied Yaremko with legs like tree stumps and knuckles that grazed the ground when he walked, and he was at that very moment building himself a place to live, converting a granary into a cabin, and with a wife by his side they could apply as a couple to homestead three hundred and twenty acres instead of just one hundred and sixty, which was all a single man was allowed to apply for.
But Lavonia was another matter, slim and delicately constructed, she was only good for light work around the house, weeding the garden, feeding the chickens, and for going to round up the milk cows morning and evening. So Wasyl Lakusta, thinking of his old age, arranged for Lavonia and the Little American Soldier to be left alone as often as possible, and even took his pocket knife and cut the cowbell off the neck of the lead cow, so the animals would be harder to find, and leave Lavonia and the Little American Soldier, who always accompanied her, longer to walk alone in the woods and get acquainted.
The Little American Soldier was not slow, and on these long walks he admired Lavonia’s dark red hair, stared into her brown eyes, and discerned by the very act of being alone with her that the rumor about Lavonia being hot-blooded was true.
As far as Lavonia was concerned, the Little American Soldier, in his khaki-gaberdine uniform, and genuine military cap that made him look like Smilin’ Jack, the hero of a Big Little Book she and her brothers and sisters shared, one of two books in the Lakusta cabin, the other being a Bible printed in Ukrainian, was just the handsomest, best-looking man she had ever seen. She particularly like the uniform. Lavonia’s best girlfriend was Stevie Dwerynchuk, and one of Stevie Dwerynchuk’s brothers was in the Canadian infantry, but when he came home on leave his uniform was the color and texture of weatherstripping, and instead of a genuine military cap that made him look like Smilin’ Jack, he wore a turned-over-trough of a cap made of the same ugly, scratchy material as his uniform.
Mrs. Wasyl Lakusta, her first name was Rose, though no one called her Rose, except Mr. Wasyl Lakusta, thinking of her old age, immediately recognized the Little American Soldier as good solid prospective son-in-law material. She boiled up many fat pyrogies (little dumplings stuffed with cottage cheese), each one bulging with the cheese; she fried them in bacon grease and onions; she had Lavonia carry them to the table and set them in front of the Little American Soldier, and when he didn’t seem to know what to do with them, she had Lavonia spoon thick sour cream over the pyrogies, sprinkle them with pepper and caraway seeds. Then Mrs. Wasyl Lakusta would appear from the kitchen, smiling from beneath her babushka, careful not to show her bad teeth, and say, ‘Eat! Eat! Lavonia cook, you eat!’ using up four of the half dozen English words she knew. And eat he did, his brown eyes happy. And he shaved each morning using Wasyl Lakusta’s straight razor, first dipping warm water from the reservoir on the cook stove and placing it in a white enamel wash basin with a scarlet line around the rim.
During the Little American Soldier’s third week there, the Lakustas butchered a pig, one they’d intended to fatten until winter, but after a long conference involving the Wasyl Lakustas, Sylvie Lakusta and her oldest brother, Nestor, and Sylvie’s fiancé, Pete Yaremko, the conference held while the Little American Soldier was walking with Lavonia Lakusta along what would have been the banks of Lily Lake, if Lily Lake hadn’t dried up several years earlier. At the conference it was decided the most important thing they could do was feed Lavonia’s prospective husband, their collectively prospective son-in-law, and brother-in-law, as well as was humanly possible. That same afternoon the pig, who had expected to live at least until the first snowfall, and since the first snowfall was known to occasionally happen in August, probably long after that, was bashed in the center of the forehead by a sledgehammer with Pete Yaremko attached to the handle of it, had barely fallen to its knees when Sylvie Lakusta slashed its throat with a butcher knife, and Wasyl Lakusta attached a rope to its left hind foot and the three of them swung it aloft from the log arch above the corral gate.
The Little American Soldier took to the Lakustas by the lake like fleas to a dog, but he especially took to Lavonia and her dark red hair, brown eyes, and delicate construction. One afternoon, he walked the four miles to the Fark General Store, where he picked up his army pay and bought for Lavonia’s dark red hair a pair of barrettes shaped like everlasting daisies, white flowers with yellow centers. And he brought home a sackful of store-bought groceries, including coffee, chocolate bars, and two packs of tailor-made cigarettes.
He showed Lavonia’s youngest brother how to tie string to the four corners of a khaki handkerchief so as to make it a parachute, and how to fold that parachute, and how to put a stone in the middle and toss it up in the air, then to duck the stone when it fell back down and watch the parachute float to the ground just like dandelion fluff.
Now the Bjornsen Brothers, both the ones in the Swinging Cowboy Musicmakers and the ones not, were no slouches as mechanics, so with a welding torch and the frame of a 1939 Terra-plane that had rolled in the ditch two miles west of Bjornsen’s Corner the winter before and been abandoned, and a certain amount of native Norwegian mechanical genius, they constructed a part or two that made the Little American Soldier’s camouflage-brindle, two-ton truck operational again.
Five weeks had passed by now, and the Little American Soldier still phoned Edmonton every week, and the United States Army still told him to hang in there, that the parts were on the way from Michigan or Minnesota or wherever, and that they hadn’t forgotten him. The Little American Soldier had tucked the dispatch pouch, full of supposedly vital information, underneath the seat of his truck and more or less forgotten about it.
Once the Bjornsen Brothers,