Lena's Rainbow

By Della May Olson

"My dear," said the gypsy queen gazing at Lena's palm, "I see many troubles in the past. I see powerful upheavals. I see death. Terrible scenes of death."

By now Lena was trembling in fear. Was her own death written in her palm? The queen continued. "Wait! There is something else! Yes, I see a rainbow. The rainbow stretches over a great body of water. You are sliding down the rainbow into the - - - I cannot continue."

"Please," said Lena. "Tell me what you see!"

"I cannot see through the water. It is too deep. Too murky. Beware!"

In 1895, a sixteen year old Polish girl escapes a wretched life in Poland to care for a rich, aging uncle in Romania, only to be sabotaged by her seemingly worthless cousin. Facing the gallows, her only hope is to escape to America where the horrors of the past can be erased. Or can they?

The story of Lena will tear at your heart strings until the last page of the book. Lena is unforgettable.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 8, 2007
• ISBN: 9781467858083

Della May Olson

Della May Olson grew up on a ranch in Montana schooled in the ‘code of the West’. From a two-room schoolhouse in Sun River, Montana, to graduating from Mesa Community College, in Mesa, Arizona , at the age of thirty-nine, as class Valedictorian, she never lost her love of horses, sports, poetry, drama, and writing. Her poetry, especially Christmas themed, has won her many awards. The main award being the love of family and friends as they perform her works. She has lived in Cottonwood, Arizona for the past forty-seven years. Married to her husband Merle for sixty-two years, they have four children, all living in Cottonwood, fifteen grandchildren, and forty-two great grandchildren. Humor and action are hallmarks of her stories and poetry. She believes in faith, hard work and miracles.

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Lena’s Rainbow

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© 2008 Della May Olson. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 9/2/2008

ISBN: 978-1-4343-3234-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4343-3235-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4678-5808-3(e)

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

This book is dedicated to Hedwig Rayter Koll Leistiko, my Grandmother, who was a remarkable lady, whose wisdom was boundless, who did not judge. If the journey that brought her to America parallels this story, so be it. The story is entirely ficticious.

Part One

Poland

Chapter 1

Lena looked out the dirty window at the cloud darkened Romanian countryside. The gray sky matched the gloom in her heart. She was sixteen years old. She was in prison. Not a dungeon with bars on the windows, but a prison of her own making, wrought from selfishness and a desire to escape the confines of her wretched home in Poland. She had pictured life in Romania, as nursemaid to her ailing uncle, Valentinius Rajtar, as the escape she needed. Now, there was no escape.

Lena! Lena! Come here!

What is it, Uncle?

I can’t sleep. Sing to me, child, begged the gaunt old man huddled under the feather bed made from the down of the relatives of the geese that cackled beneath the window and chased Lena each time she left the run down cottage to go to the outhouse, or the garden, or the barn. The more she threatened them with the broom, the more they accepted the challenge to geeseomanic warfare. So far Lena had managed to outrun them, but she looked forward to having goose for Easter dinner.

I’m here, Uncle Val.

Why are you here? Where is Julius?

He is gone. Your son prefers business elsewhere. We are alone.

Help me! He wants me dead, muttered the agitated father of Julius. If he had any feeling for me, he would be here, not you. Why are you here? repeated the old man forgetting that he had just posed the question. Where is Laura?

Aunt Laura is dead, Uncle. In paradise. Waiting for you. Go to her.

She took his gnarled hand in her soft hands, massaging the hand, the arm, and the worn out shoulder of her mother’s brother, her uncle, as she silently wished him in his grave. She had been in Romania for only a week, yet she could understand why her cousin, Julius, had left her alone in these sordid surroundings without recourse from anyone.

It had been her choice to come to Romania to care for her uncle. She could have remained in Poland under the strict surveillance of a domineering mother and two older sisters who treated her as their personal slave. She did not miss them. It was Pawel, and Josephine, her younger brother and sister that she cried for her in her sleep.

Life was hard in Poland. Her father’s farm land was marginal to say the least. They were lucky to raise enough potatoes to see them through a bitter cold Polish winter. Along with the potatoes were the cabbages. Lena could see her mother tamping the thinly shredded cabbage into the large sauerkraut crock. Sometimes she stuffed a whole head of cabbage in the fermenting mass so that there would be cabbage leaves to wrap a special treat of rice and sausage for a holiday feast. Lena could smell the sauerkraut as it filled their dinner plates with its sweet sour taste. Sauerkraut and potatoes. Sauerkraut and potatoes. On special occasions a piece of pork fat was thrown in the mixture.

There had been an unusually cold winter the year that Lena was sent to Romania. They made it seem that it was her choice to go, and that she was doing the family a great service to care for the sick old uncle. But Lena knew it would mean one less mouth for the family to feed, one less body to clothe and keep warm, one less child to send to school, one less worry about her virginity.

Lena Tomaszewska was born in Skowierzyn, Tarnobrzeg, Galizien, Poland in the year 1879. Sometimes she lived in Prussia, sometimes Austria, sometimes Poland, but her home never moved, only those who ruled her country. The Pope in Rome was their savior. His pontific hand acted as a shield to protect the peasants and the poor of Poland. In return they paid their offerings, attended their meetings, baptized their babies before they were dry from the womb, and prayed to a favorite saint to intercede for them with a God whom they feared and who favored few. Life was not as easy for their Jewish neighbors.

Jacob Steinvich could not hide his Jewish heritage. His dark hair, his long arched nose, his bearing spoke Jewish to all who knew him. Lena knew him well, but she forgot his background as they crossed the border into Russia, as children, on secret jaunts to pick wild strawberries, and climb the forbidden Russian trees. They lived next farm to each other and from childhood had been friends. When Sophia, and Katerina tormented the younger Lena to exasperation, she found refuge behind the hedge separating the Tomaszewska farm from the Steinvich farm. Jacob would always find her.

It was as great a sin for a Jewish boy to associate with a Catholic girl as it was for a Catholic girl to befriend a Jewish boy. Jacob received more than one whipping for what went on behind the hedge. Jacob was two years older than Lena.

If it was a sin to speak to a Catholic girl, it was a greater sin to love a Catholic girl. Jacob loved Lena. Lena loved Jacob. Their kisses had been fun and innocent until one week ago when Jacob received his orders to report to the army. He wanted all of his playmate and sweetheart before he had to go. Tomorrow was the day that he must leave to serve his required time in the army.

Don’t go, Jacob, Lena begged after being released from a passionate kiss, her arms refusing to let go of him. I will die without you.

You know I have to go, Jacob said as he pushed the clinging Lena from their close embrace. I have no choice. Two years in the army is required. I have no choice.

But what will I do without you? sobbed Lena.

You can embroidery pretty linen. You can learn to cook. You can study to become Jewish.

You are asking the impossible. I can no more become Jewish than a chicken can become a pig or a snake. Why can’t we run away somewhere, to England or America? You can go to your church and I can go to mine.

And our children? Whose church will they go to?

They can choose for themselves.

Like throwing a handful of seeds into a potting bed and telling them to choose whether to be a weed or a flower. If you love me as you say you do, you will be waiting for me right here, in this very spot, where we have met since I can’t remember when. Oh, Lena, what fun we have had growing up together. I want it to last forever. Don’t let a pompous pope in Rome, with his chains called religion, keep us apart. Wait for me!

And will Anna Goldman be waiting, too? Waiting along with your mother and father and the rabbi? I know about your Jewish weddings. You have no choice.

Lena, you are the one I love. Two years will pass quickly. Wait for me. Everything will work out. Love will make it so.

I will not wait for you, Jacob. Two years is too long. It is a long dark tunnel and I do not see a light at the end. I do not know where I will be in two years. I hope it will be far from here. She pushed herself away from her childhood playmate and sweetheart and turned to leave. Goodbye, Jacob. May the God whom your people have murdered keep you safe.

Lena, come back! Jacob did not run after her. He turned the other direction and headed for the army and the inevitable Anna Goldman.

Josephine ran to meet her older sister as Lena entered the house. Lena, why are you crying? Mama got a letter. Did you know Aunt Laura is dead? Is that why you are crying?

No, silly. And I am not crying!

Yes, you are. I can see you are. Mama, Mama, Lena is crying!

Well, we will see about that. Come here, girl, shouted the mother of the brood sitting around the hearth. Where have you been, young lady? And is that straw I see in your hair?

I have been out to visit the pigs. They do not question my every move.

Lena, sit down, said her mother. We have just gotten a letter from Uncle Val’s son, Julius. You remember him, don’t you? The fine young man with the dark wavy hair and the cheery smile. He is your cousin. Anyhow, the letter tells us that Aunt Laura, God rest her soul, has passed away.

Why, should it matter to me. I hardly know them. We have only seen them once when I was only six. Lena was having a hard time focusing on the gravity of the situation. She had just told her would be lover that he wasn’t worth waiting for. A dead Aunt in Romania whom she hardly knew seemed of little consequence. The looks bestowed on her by her mother and older sisters made her come to attention.

Lena, you have always been hard at heart, continued her mother. And don’t think we don’t know about you and the Jew boy. Your sweet cousin, Julius Rajtar has written to us to ask if one of my lovely daughters might come to Romania and be nurse to his father. Uncle Valentinus is quite ill and unable to care for himself. Julius has taken a job that requires him to be away from home a good deal. He will pay for the services of a nursemaid, plus give her room and board. He would prefer a family member to be in attendance on his father.

Lena looked from one sister to the other. She knew they had already made up their minds. Pawel ran to her side and cried, don’t go Lena! I will miss you. Who will sing to me and tell me stories?

Haven’t we heard of trouble along the Romanian border? Mama, you said you hoped it did not affect your brother and family, said Lena who was always quick to hear the latest news or gossip. Sometimes her mind got things straight and sometimes she was merely confused and stored the information in her memory to figure it out later. Now the trouble seemed ominous and foreboding. Or maybe exciting.

Nonsense! said her stern unyielding mother. If Val had trouble, he would solve it. And not with words, either. My brother is a giant of a man.

Sophia suddenly became the loving, understanding, considerate older sister. I would go and gladly, but Joseph Walenty will be home from the army in one month and I promised to wait for him until he returned. The two years have gone so fast. I have my trousseau all ready. We will be married as soon as possible. Lena, dear, I am sure you are very happy for me and would not want me to be gone when Joseph returns.

Lena put her hand over her mouth, spit into it, and rubbed it on her skirt. To herself she said, Of course you waited two years. No one else would look twice at you.

Katerina was the next to fawn over Lena. Of all of us here, Lena, you are the most loving and kind. You would be a perfect nurse for Uncle Val. Or for anyone else as far as that goes. You must go to him, dear little sister, for his sake and for ours. It will make our hearts glad to know that he will be in such capable hands. And he is rich!

Lena did not spit this time. Rich! Her mother was fond of bragging on her well-to-do brother. It was almost comical to see her sisters and their two-faced slobbering. Of course, she would go to Romania. It was her chance to leave these sordid surroundings that her family called home. The sooner the better. She would never have to see Jacob Steinvich again.

Chapter 2

The mountains of Romania were breath taking. Julius had sent money for her passage by coach. It was a long five day ride. The road followed the Vistula River to the the foothills and passes of the Carpathian Mountains. Four nights were spent in inns along the way. Lena did not mind. She took in the wonders of the country as a sponge soaks up water. She wanted to embrace the mountains and the rivers and keep them with her forever. She stamped their picturesque beauty indelibly in her mind to recall in her dreams. She rejoiced as the distance took her farther and farther from Poland. She would never return. Her future was glowing in rainbow hues.

If Lena had inherited any gift from her mother, it was stubbornness. Sometimes she wished she were more kind and gentle. She had always had the ability to see the many facets of behavior in people. Not that she forgave them for their meanness or stupidity, but she understood why they did what they did. She had not yet developed the ability to vocally express empathy or understanding. A kind word welling in her throat caused her to choke or sometimes want to vomit.

The higher reaches of the mountains were still held in the grip of winter, but spring was mellowing the lower valleys and promising a rebirth of everything good and beautiful. Lena could not have been happier. She gazed in wonder at chalets and castles with walls and orchards situated on high ridges. How could anyone be so wealthy? She could hardly wait to see her relatives home.

She was wearing her Sunday best, a gray dress with a hand crocheted lace collar. A black felt bonnet covered her dark brown curls. Her high broad forehead balanced her somewhat square Bohemian face with the heavy dark brows and long lashes framing dark brown eyes that were two shades darker than her hair. Her rosy cheeks, and perfect nose made red by the cold ride, and larger than normal full red lips, made her cousin, Julius, take a second look as he arrived in Laslow, a small Romanian village, to pick her up in his buggy.

You must be Lena, he said as he bowed and took her hand to kiss it. I am Julius. Welcome to Laslow. I have come to take you home.

Lena pulled her hand away from him. You are my cousin. I don’t need you kissing my hand. I assume I will be your servant.

Proud, are we? I am sorry to have offended you. It is plain you do not recognize the manners of a gentleman. I would like us to be friends. Lena could not take back her common words and so pointed her chin in the air as she climbed into the waiting carriage.

Lena believed her relatives to be wealthy. She had often listened to her mother bragging about her genius of a brother who was a great inventor and scientist. She actually knew little or nothing about them. Her mother referred to her brother, Valentinus, as the genius in the family. ‘But with genius comes stupidity’ she often reminded her children. ‘A genius can blow up a mountain but cannot tie his shoelaces. I am glad we are all stupid.’

Lena refused to be stupid, even if her mother continually pointed this out to her and her siblings. She realized that saying so could make it so, and each time her mother chose to humiliate her offspring with such verbal slime, Lena tried to shut it out by running outdoors and finding something beautiful or wondrous to look at. But sometimes she wondered if her mother was right. It had been voiced too often. Only a rainbow lighting the sky with its amazing wonder could keep Lena from succumbing to the abusive words. Lena loved rainbows.

Lena expected her new home to be a cozy cottage surrounded by rose bushes and hollyhocks and daisies. She was mistaken. Tulips and crocuses should now be blossoming in the early spring. Surely the pigsty where her cousin was stopping was not to be her home.

Why are we stopping here? she inquired. Their ride had been in silence. She did not know how to speak to the handsome young man driving the buggy. His dark wavy hair set off a long face with a square jaw and a resolute chin. His thoughts were far away from the cousin sitting beside him.

Julius had one more delivery to make. One more trip to the ‘never never land’ that existed between the country of his birth and rivaling factions in the hills. He could not make up his mind as to who was right and who was wrong. He had studied the writings of Karl Marx and sympathized with his views. Now there was a new voice being heard, that of Vladimir Illich Ulyanov, a Russian whom some referred to as Lenin. A worker’s revolution sounded extreme to Julius, but then, what had the rich of Laslow ever done for him or his family. His mother lay in a shallow grave hollowed out of the hillside beside the fresh water spring that she loved. No one mourned her passing. Not even this silent sprite of a girl riding beside him. Not once had she inquired about the family she was to serve. Like his father, who was her uncle, her heart was made of ice and stone. Were all women so?

They had been traveling for two hours. The wide road in the town gradually narrowed to a dirt track with grass growing between the ruts made by the few wheels that traversed it. The road gradually wound up into the mountains through a valley that closed in on them as they traveled eastward. The river running through the valley followed the same pattern as the road. What had been a wide deep river as it ran through the village was now a meandering, gentle flowing stream, that the horse and buggy occasionally forded with ease.

They had passed few houses on the way. This house had been the first in at least two miles. This miserable looking cottage was out of place in the beautiful countryside. It was a scar on the landscape. The mountains rose in splendor at the back of the V formed by the valley. The sides of the valley sloped upward to more mountains. Snow capped the distant mountains. Closer, bits of green were peeking out from snow banks dirtied by a winter of wind and dust. The house looked like the dirty snow banks, but the warm zephyrs that would melt the snow banks and let spring break through, would only expose the ugliness of the house in contrast to the beauty of fresh, vibrant spring.

Lena asked for the second time why they had stopped here. Julius had gotten down from the carriage and was walking around to her side to assist her to the ground.

This is where we live. Get down. I will show you around.

But, but, - - - I thought you - - -

You thought you were coming to a palace. Think again. My father preferred living in the mountains away from the hustle and bustle of the city. He invents things, or he did until disease robbed his mind. He did not want anyone spying on him, so this is his castle and his laboratory.

Well, I should say he would have his wish here. I doubt anyone would stop here. What about Aunt Laura, your mother?

Ahhh, that is a different matter. She hated it here. Said she would do nothing to improve the place, hoping my father would relent and move back to the city.

What killed her? Why did she die? asked Lena.

She didn’t die. She escaped. Death was a welcome retreat. You ask too many questions.

Did she take her own life?

How can you say that? My mother was a devout Catholic. Suicide is not an option. Julius covered his face with his hands. When he took them away, his countenance had changed from handsome to ugly. Deep lines creased his forehead, and his eyes had a far away look. He continued, I was in the middle. I could not side with either for fear the other would be angry with me.

And does that bother you?

Does what bother me?

To have someone angry with you? I loved to provoke my older sisters. After they wailed on me for awhile, my father would wail on them. It was the only fun I ever had. My mother always sided with my sisters.

Julius laughed. Indecision. Always indecision. Afraid to take sides. It was almost funny. Laughter had saved him in the past, and so he laughed. It was the first time Lena had seen him smile. It was like magic, transforming his face from dark to light. I hope you will not wail on me, what ever that means, he said. They had reached the door of the house and were about to enter.

Do you think your father will like me?

I can’t say. He is funny in his old age. He has a lot of pain from his arthritis. Pretty well crippled. And his mind - - - he seems to - - - - Julius could not finish the sentence.

How long has he been ill?

"He won’t go to a doctor. I am sure it was meningitis or encephalitis or something that he had about a year ago. The terrible high fevers burned away his ability to think. His mind is gone. There I have said it, -