The Midwife's Tale

by Delia Parr

  She chuckled. “I think that’s something you should discuss with Thomas.”

  “I will. As soon as we get there. Perhaps you could speak to him for me so he’ll know what my plans are. For now, would you come back to Eleanor’s room? We’d like you to pray with us.”

  The following morning, Martha lost no time implementing her plan to save both mother and child. While Micah waited downstairs to intercept Dr. Park, Martha tackled the room first, careful to avoid the bathing tub now sitting in front of the hearth. She tied back the drapes and opened the windows—only several inches, since the air had turned quite brisk. She left the bowls and linens on top of the bureau, but packed the medicines into a box she set out in the hallway.

  She paused several times to listen, but heard no sounds from downstairs that suggested the doctor might have arrived. Satisfied that she could proceed uninterrupted for a spell, she helped Eleanor from the bed into the chair. “Now, sit still,” she warned. “I want you to get used to sitting up before we attempt that bath.”

  With one eye on her patient, she changed the bed linens and found a fresh day dress for Eleanor in the trunk at the foot of the bed. With everything well under way, she opened her bag and perused the contents. “The hot water isn’t here for your bath yet, but while we’re waiting, you should get to choose the scent you’d prefer to add to the bathwater. I have some lavender here . . . and, yes, I thought so, some mint and lilac.”

  Eleanor winced when she cracked a smile, but giggled anyway. “Mint, I think. Do you always have bath scents in your bag? I thought you only carried remedies.”

  “My simples are remedies that are as different as our complaints. Sometimes, a woman just needs to be . . . pampered. I have some salve for your lips, too. It’s been so dry in here, it’s a wonder they aren’t worse.”

  Thundering voices. Thundering footsteps charging up the stairs. Apparently, Dr. Park had not taken the news well. Martha froze in place, then hurried to stand next to Eleanor. She had barely turned to face the doorway when a middle-aged thundercloud of a man stormed into the room and rocked back on his heels the moment he reached the side of the bed.

  Micah arrived within seconds, but remained just inside the doorway. “I think it’s best if you leave, Dr. Park.”

  His command sounded like a plea, which the doctor promptly ignored. His dark eyes blazed with fury as he glanced around the room. His lips twitched and he sputtered a bit before he exploded, filling the room with the bitter accusations he hurled at Martha. “You!” He shook his finger at her. “You will be responsible for not one death but two! What kind of charlatan are you to prey on a weak, defenseless—”

  “I am a midwife,” Martha said calmly while her heart galloped in her chest.

  “Same thing,” he spat.

  She blanched, but held her tongue.

  He dismissed Martha with a snort and gazed at his former patient with surprising tenderness. “Eleanor, please. You mustn’t be swayed by this . . . this woman. You’re very ill. You’re not strong enough—”

  “Eleanor is very weak, that’s true,” Martha interjected to prevent Eleanor from being drawn into a battle she was too weak to wage on her own behalf. She put her hand on Eleanor’s shoulder and felt the girl quaking. “Bloodletting will weaken anyone, but most especially a teeming woman. Using emetics and purges to cleanse her system very well may cause her to expel the babe. Medications to keep her sedated may, in fact, be harmful. But Eleanor isn’t ill. She’s teeming, a perfectly natural state for married women. With proper diet, along with moderate activity and fresh air, she’ll be able to gain the strength she needs to birth her babe.”

  There. She put the explosive issue dividing them out in the open, fully aware that neither she nor the doctor would budge from their respective viewpoints. Doctors, by training, treated pregnancy as an illness cured only by birth, which was yet another illness that required treatment.

  Midwives, on the other hand, saw the entire process, from conception through birthing, as a purely natural process that usually proceeded without the need for intervention.

  She stared directly into the doctor’s furious eyes and refused to blink for fear he might sense she was weak.

  He glared back at her. “Your notions might be well-intentioned, but they are sorely misguided,” he spat. “Your ignorance will exact a high price when you fail. Are you prepared to pay that price? Will you be able to look Eleanor and her husband in the eye when they bury yet another babe because you interfered and contradicted the advice of a trained physician?”

  She refused to take the bait he dangled in front of her, and held tight rein on her temper. “I respect your formal medical education, even as I would ask that you acknowledge my own apprenticeship and training. I know when my skills are not adequate, and I send for a doctor without hesitation in those cases. This is not one of them,” she said firmly.

  He raised both brows, but when he attempted to speak, she cut him off. “Neither one of us has the right to argue anything here now that will distress the patient or her husband. It’s time for you to leave. Quickly, if you will. It’s time for Eleanor’s bath.”

  An ominous silence enveloped the room—until Micah’s voice rang out, firm and clear this time. “Dr. Park?”

  The doctor exhaled, cast Martha a scowl, and turned on his heels. When he reached Micah, he poked the younger man in the chest. “I intend to speak to your father. He’ll make you listen to me,” he snapped, and made a noisy escape through the hall and down the steps. When the front door opened and quickly slammed shut, Martha flinched, but Micah held firm. “I can handle my father. Just tell me how soon I can take Eleanor to Trinity.”

  Martha let out a long breath. “Let her build up her strength for a week. I’ll write down everything I want you to do,” she suggested, looking down at her patient and offering her a reassuring smile.

  A week from now, Thomas would be able to welcome his daughter home, although he would have the formidable task of keeping his sister at bay. Come winter, God willing, Thomas would be able to welcome his first grandchild, which would also help him to see a future for himself without Sally by his side.

  Her heart trembled.

  Couldn’t someone, somewhere, help Victoria come home to her mother, too?

  19

  She had been a coward. She had merely been practical. She had been a coward.

  Martha swung from one extreme thought to the other as she returned from the apothecary, several squares from the modest town house where Eleanor and Micah waited to bid her farewell, with a new supply of simples she ordinarily purchased from Doc Beyer in her bag. If she had had any courage, she would have gone to see Dr. McMillan and talked to him about buying remedies from him, too.

  “I’m a coward,” she muttered, even though she had saved considerable coin by getting her supplies in Clarion. She had also gotten a new remedy for Samuel Meeks, one the druggist claimed might work wonders for the reclusive man who was losing his vision. Besides, coming to Clarion to purchase the remedies from the apothecary had given her the opportunity to visit Eleanor without revealing the true purpose of her visit to anyone else.

  She stopped at an intersection and waited for a break in the parade of carriages and wagons before crossing the street.

  The mid-morning sun, perched in a flawless sky of blue, was bright and warmed the day, promising a fair ride home. She wrinkled her nose, unaccustomed to the stench. Although Clarion was only a middling city, compared to Philadelphia or New York, all the trappings of city life abounded. Refuse and human waste littered the streets. Shops and homes crowded together to accommodate the burgeoning population. According to Micah, despite new laws pigs roamed at will, creating havoc now and then when they scooted under and around moving vehicles while searching for food.

  She scanned the street but saw no sign of the pigs. Relieved, she hiked up the hem of her skirt and sidestepped her way across the street between a Conestoga wagon obviously heading west and a farmer�
�s wagon loaded with squash. When she finally got to the cobblestone walk that shopkeepers had been sweeping clean when she passed by earlier, she dropped her skirt back into place and used long strides to loosen her leg muscles in anticipation of the long ride ahead.

  The few precious coins she had left in her purse made it easy to avoid the temptations offered by the sundry shops along her route, but when she spied a leather-bound daybook in the window of Lynch’s Stationery Store, her steps slowed. The shopkeeper was busy rearranging the display and adding more merchandise, but she kept her gaze on the daybook.

  Petite, the journal was no larger than the size of her hand. The vine of flowers etched on the front cover created a delicate frame around the centered numbers, 1830. She had never owned anything quite so lovely and most certainly nothing as expensive. Actually, the little sign listing the price had fallen forward, but she did not have to see it to know the daybook was far beyond her means, although with only a few months left in the year, the price surely had been lowered.

  After the shopkeeper moved the daybook and some sheet music to make room for a display of picture puzzles, she followed his every movement. When he flipped the sign for the daybook upright and set it back in front of the daybook, her hand tightened on the handle of her bag, which also held her coins.

  He caught her interest and looked down at the daybook. He held it up, cocked his head, and raised his brow.

  Embarrassed, she shook her head.

  He paused, crumpled the sign, and held up one finger.

  She moistened her lips. A single dollar was an unbelievably low price, but still more than she could afford to pay for something that was a luxury she could not justify. Without any specific use for the daybook, the purchase would be a whim, and she had been practical for far too long to change now.

  She listened to her purse instead of her heart, and shook her head before turning away and hurrying on her way.

  Grace was saddled. Martha’s bags were strapped into place, along with a meal to eat on the way home. Anxious to arrive back in Trinity before dark, Martha waited patiently while Eleanor finished writing a letter to her father.

  The rose-colored dress the younger woman wore softened her pallor, and her eyes were twinkling when she finished and handed Martha the letter. “You won’t forget to give this to Father?”

  Martha tucked the letter into her pocket. “I’ll stop by his house before I set foot to home. Besides, your father’s been caring for one of my patients, remember?”

  “Oh, Bird. That’s right.” Eleanor chuckled, apparently still amused by the tale Martha had told her last night. “Poor Father. He’s detested all winged creatures for as long as I can remember.”

  Martha cocked a brow. “You know why, don’t you?”

  A full grin. “No, but I gather you do.”

  The memory made Martha smile, too. “Thomas was only ten or eleven at the time. Like most boys his age, he was rambunctious, full of energy, and anxious to prove his mettle. That particular day, he and James decided to see which one of them could climb all the way to the top of that big chestnut tree behind the meetinghouse. You remember. The one that lightning struck some years back?”

  A nod.

  “Well, James went first, made a good third of the way up, and stopped, which wasn’t like him at all. Nevertheless, your father proceeded to pass him. Halfway up, he happened upon a bird’s nest and disturbed the mother bird, who was tending her young. Unfortunately, they were jays, and before your father could wriggle away, a good flock of very angry jays answered the mother’s distress call and pecked his poor head something fierce.”

  She chuckled. “Grandmother Poore patched him up. She told me she had to snip away a good bit of his hair to clean the wounds in his scalp. Poor Thomas. He bore the brunt of his chums’ cruel taunts long after his hair grew back in.”

  Eleanor dissolved into laughter, bringing a healthy flush to her cheeks and a vitality to her appearance. “He never told me that story. Now I know why he’s not fond of birds.”

  Martha nodded. “We all have stories we’re reluctant to share with our children until they’re grown. Maybe that’s a mistake,” she mused as her thoughts drifted, once more, to Victoria.

  Martha had plenty of her own stories, of course, but she had not shared the most difficult or most embarrassing ones with her daughter, either, and she suspected most parents had done the same. Perhaps it was nothing more than a well-intentioned effort by parents to paint themselves as more suitable models for their children to follow. Fear that any faults or misdeeds or misadventures might somehow weaken their authority might play some part as well.

  The blade, however, swung both ways.

  The cost of appearing more saintly than human gave parents a selective memory, if not an impossible model for the children to emulate. To be fair, adults probably blocked out experiences that if shared would humble them before their own children, when in essence, their very humanity, replete with failures, should have become a source of encouragement that the children, too, could overcome the most troubling of mistakes.

  With new insight into her own relationship with Victoria, as well as Oliver, she saw the role she had played in her daughter’s disappearance from a different perspective, embraced her mistakes, and quickly thought of a way to make amends when Victoria came home.

  “I must be off,” she murmured. “I expect to see you in Trinity next week. Micah knows exactly how to get you home, so let him worry about that. You concentrate on getting stronger, and have faith.” She embraced the young woman. “I’ll see you soon,” she promised, and departed.

  She made one stop in Clarion before she left. When she did, her purse was lighter, but her heart was far happier than when she had arrived.

  Martha followed Dillon’s Stream all the way home and arrived at sunset. An unusual number of men milled about, mostly along West Main Street, so she took the covered bridge at the western end of town and crossed over to the other side. She waved to the Lynn sisters, who were outside sweeping the sawdust from the new planked sidewalk in front of the confectionery, and made a mental note to stop in to see them tomorrow to see how their lozenges were coming along.

  True to her word, she rode directly to Thomas’s home to deliver Eleanor’s letter. She was both relieved and dismayed to discover that Thomas was not home. The housekeeper, Eva Clark, was either out visiting herself or napping, so Martha simply slipped the letter under the door along with a hastily scribbled note asking Thomas to bring Bird home to her.

  Once she reached the tavern, she had to make a real effort to get past the wagons and horses overcrowding the yard to get Grace into the stable and settled down for the night. Spurred by the tempting aroma of mutton stew that laced the air, she did not bother to unpack when she got to her room. She only took the time to hang up her cape and wash up before joining Lydia and Annabelle in the kitchen.

  “Smells delicious,” she offered in a loud voice in order to be heard over the din of heated conversation in the other room.

  Lydia, who was lading servings onto two trenchers while the younger woman cut several slices of bread, looked up and wiped her brow with the hem of her apron. “You’re back early. Did you get everything you needed in Clarion?”

  “And then some. The apothecary there is quite well supplied,” Martha responded. Using the need for supplies she could only get at the apothecary’s as her excuse for her trip also meant she did not have to share anything about seeing Eleanor or mention the daybook she had purchased.

  She took the knife from Annabelle. “Here. Let me do that while you serve those platters. It looks like you could both use an extra pair of hands today.”

  Looking peaked, the girl sighed. “Yes, ma’am. It’s been this busy almost all day,” she complained as she lifted the trenchers and carried them to a table where hungry patrons greeted her with a cheer.

  “Militia day,” Lydia mumbled when Martha looked at her for an explanation.

  She had forgot
ten all about militia day, but at least now she knew why Thomas was not at home. As a major, he would probably not return home until very late, which meant she had little hope of reclaiming Bird tonight.

  Lydia stretched and rubbed the base of her spine. “Always a bad day for the back.”

  “And laboring women,” Martha added. “Poor Genevieve Smith. She was frightened enough as it was, delivering her first. Hearing rounds of rifle shot and having the cannon balls nearly shake the house off its foundation was about the last thing she needed. I don’t suppose they bothered selecting a new practice site yet.”

  “No,” James offered as he entered the kitchen. He pecked his wife on the cheek and gave Martha a smile. “Glad you’re back. As for changing the site, I wouldn’t expect that to happen any time soon. They were using the site on Double Trouble Creek next to the Smith farm for lots of years before Smith ever showed up.”

  Martha waved her knife in the air. “But now there’s the Holts’ and the Winslows’ and the Petersons’ farms nearby, too. Not a one of them will have a hen laying eggs again for days. The cows’ milk will be bad, too. You’d think they’d move the practice site just out of respect for all those nearby families. It’s not like there isn’t enough open land just a few miles up the creek.”

  James grinned. “Tradition is hard to break, but it doesn’t bother me any. Militia day will always be good for my purse wherever they practice.”

  He narrowed his gaze. “Grace needs new shoes. Soon. You might want to talk to Jack Engels. See if he can take care of her before you go traipsing off again.”

  “First thing in the morning. I promise.” She cut off the heel of a new loaf of bread, slathered it with butter, and took a bite. She chewed slowly, savoring the taste while her stomach growled for more. “I’m so hungry I could eat this whole loaf of bread and still have room for a plate of stew.”