“My shoes! My shoes, Mama!”
“It doesn’t matter,” Raina said, as she desperately tried to cover the girl’s wet stockings with her hands; her shoes were gone, and the water was already freezing into ice on her tiny, vulnerable feet. “We have to go.”
But how? She shouted for Tor, for Arvid, for anybody. As she stood in about two feet of icy slush, there were no words to describe the shocking cold, there was no way to prevent it from racing up her legs, her torso, devouring her heart. She thought she might freeze where she stood, an icy statue with an equally frozen child in her arms, and no one would find them until spring.
“Hand her up to me!” It was Tor; somehow she could make out that he was on his stomach, leaning over the bank, his arms outstretched.
“I can’t.” Raina began to sob; she was reaching as high as she could, Rosa now ominously silent and limp in her arms, but she couldn’t quite get the child to Tor. Her arms were like noodles, seemingly without bones to support them as they shook.
“Try, Raina, try!” And it was like Papa’s voice in her ears, although she knew it was Tor’s; even though she couldn’t see him, she imagined Tor’s encouraging eyes watching her, sure she wouldn’t disappoint him. So she did try. With a strangled cry she heaved herself farther out of the slush, standing on her toes, straining every muscle in her torso and arms to raise up the deadweight of the child, and finally she felt Tor’s arms mingled with hers as he reached down and, with a groan, hauled the girl up to the bank.
She was so relieved, so exhausted with emotion and exertion, that she was tempted to fall down where she was. Tor would get the others across, get them to the house. She knew this with the certainty that she knew the sun would rise in the morning. So Raina could simply sink into the bank of snow and ice, let the snow cover her up, and close her eyes and sleep. Every nerve, every muscle in her body cried out for this rest. Her eyelids began to flutter; she felt weak, limp—
Until an arm reached out and grabbed hers, and a fierce voice invaded her torpor.
“Raina, you have to keep going. I need you, Raina.”
She shook her head, she tried to quiet the tremor that was rattling her entire body, but she couldn’t. She reached up, and allowed Tor to help her up the bank, her feet stumbling, now feeling like entire blocks of ice, but somehow she made it.
She flopped like a fish beside an inert Rosa, and Enid and Sofia. She watched, numbly, as Tor made his way—even more unsteadily—across the bridge and returned with Clara in his arms.
Then she pushed herself up, and crossed the bridge again, too—she barely noticed her skirts this time, her entire lower body was so numb. She grabbed Eva, unceremoniously, into her arms and gingerly crossed the bridge, dropped the girl on the ground, and went back. Somehow. Her mind had stopped working—thank goodness, for that meant it stopped questioning, as well. She was operating on pure instinct now.
The older children were able to cross on their own, with Raina on one end of the bridge shouting encouragement, and Tor on the other doing the same. And finally, they were all across the creek.
Rosa wasn’t moving at all, but the other little girls were able to stand; there wasn’t time to tie them all together again. Tor picked Rosa up and he and Raina herded the children in the direction they thought led to the house. With every shuffle, every pitiful mewl, like a weak kitten, from an exhausted child who had come to school that morning happy and well and strong, Raina prayed that they were going in the right direction. But she simply couldn’t tell.
Until she heard a ringing…faint, then getting stronger. A cowbell. Someone was desperately ringing a cowbell.
“That’s Mama,” Tor shouted, joyful. “That’s Mama ringing the bell!”
Raina started to weep, although strangely there were no more tears in her, no more moisture inside; the vortex of ice and frigid air had sucked it all up, dried her out. She urged the children on. They all heard the bell ringing with a frenzy. They stumbled toward a faint light, now veiled, now clearly visible, now veiled again, until they were standing, dumbstruck, in front of a grey farmhouse with kerosene lamps burning in every window. A frantic woman in a big wool cap with earflaps on her head, shivering in a man’s overcoat, was standing with the door open, ringing a cowbell with all her might. When she saw the bedraggled group materialize out of the storm like spirits, she gave a cry of joy, dropped the bell, and rushed out to grab Sofia, who was about to tumble over where she stood.