The Frontiersman’s Daughter

by Laura Frantz

  I believe that’s the finest man I’ve ever seen.

  33

  At the end of August a string of accidents around the settlement nearly brought Ma Horn out of confinement. Asa Forbes lost two of his toes to an ax, Sadie Harold’s child’s hands were scalded badly in a tub of lye, and Mourning Grubbs’s son Titus broke his arm for the second time. Yet it was Hugh McClary’s fall from his horse that most urgently required care, though Lael would not hear of it. Even Ma Horn’s entreaties fell on deaf ears.

  “I’ll not set foot on McClary land,” Lael announced, not caring that his son stood just inside the door frame. “Hugh McClary shot my pa inside this very fort and nearly killed him. As it was, Pa limped to his dying day.” Winded, she paused for breath, mindful of the fracas he’d caused at the fort with Captain Jack. “Let Mister High-and-Mighty McClary heal himself. I’ll see to the rest.”

  And so Lael rode off, bristling at the temerity of the McClary clan in seeking her out. She cared not a whit what became of the lot of them, nor did it matter what the settlement thought of her refusal.

  Lael rode to the Harold cabin first, and the mare was in a lather by the time she got there. The burned girl was a pitiful sight, not yet two years old, her small hands blistered and drawn from the lye. She was still gripped by such convulsive sobs her whole frame shook. There was little to do but wrap the hands with a healing salve and linen. Lael produced a pouch of herbs to ease the pain, but her own lack of helpful knowledge made her heartsore. She left the cabin without accepting payment, for she felt she’d not earned any and promised to come again.

  Titus Grubbs’s broken arm was a simpler matter. As she pulled the arm into place to set it, albeit gently, the boy did not so much as wince. He stared at the cabin wall with faraway eyes, jaw slack. She spoke to him in low tones as she fashioned a splint. “Ma Horn tells me she set this same arm in the spring. It’s a wonder you’ve lived to be ten years old.” He said nothing, but a faint smile tugged at his mouth. She continued quietly, “Sometimes a bone is weakened by too many breaks. How’d it happen this time, Titus?”

  He looked down at his arm and a single tear fell, wetting Lael’s hand as she worked, surprising her with his sudden turn of emotion. His voice was so low she had to bend closer to hear him.

  “I—fell—off the loft ladder.”

  Lael straightened, pausing to watch his mother through the open doorway as she tended a haunch of venison on a spit outside the cabin, and tried a different tack.

  “Do you have any brothers or sisters?”

  “Them’s all dead.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly, thinking it an all too familiar answer. “I just lost my pa, as well.”

  A flicker of interest lit his eyes and he looked at her, then away. “I heard tell your pa was a real hero.”

  “I suppose he was. Want to hear a story of how he made an escape downriver from here?”

  As she bound his arm she told him how Pa had jumped from the rocky bluff along the river into the towering maple. When she’d finished, he darted another look at her and whispered, “Tell another.”

  She smiled. “I’ll tell about the time he tussled with a painter when I come back to tend your arm.”

  She gathered her bag and went out of the cabin to speak to his mother. The woman wiped greasy hands on an apron but kept her eyes averted. “Thank you kindly. I’m always tellin’ him he ought not to be so rambunctious, climbin’ them trees and the like. But he don’t never listen.”

  At the words Lael paused, her hands going limp on the saddlebag she’d just tied shut. Climbing trees and the like? What had Titus said? Something about a fall from the loft ladder?

  There was no offer of payment. Had there been she wouldn’t have taken it. She got on the mare and took a last look around. The woman had already disappeared inside. Everything Lael’s eyes rested on spoke of neglect and decay. The barn, a poorly built affair, had a door off one hinge. The garden was choked with weeds and only half-planted in corn. Why, even the dogs looked half starved. She tried to recall what Ma Horn had told her about Mourning Grubbs and her son, but nothing came to mind. There was no man about, truly, nor it seemed had there ever been.

  On the long trek up the mountain to Asa Forbes’s place, Lael passed a group of wild hogs foraging on chestnut mast in the woods. They grunted as she passed, wild and almost comical in expression. The thought of fresh meat made her mouth water, as she’d not had any for some time, not since a settler had paid her with a haunch of venison in June.

  She found Asa in a crude lean-to that seemed to cling to the rocky ridge. A bed of rock had been laid for the foundation of a small cabin, and a crop of corn was growing precipitously on a ledge, all that was necessary for proving up a settler’s four hundred acres. His four horses, considered among the finest in all Kentucke, grazed near a creek.

  Entering his humble dwelling, Lael felt awkward and tonguetied. Women and children were one thing, but doctoring a man was quite another. She wondered if he was still sweet on her. He limped to a pile of blankets and removed the bloody bandages for her to see. The ax had done its work, for the two smallest toes on his right foot were completely severed. The unmistakable smell of corn liquor threaded the stale air and, from Asa’s manner, it had been employed, and perhaps enjoyed, liberally.

  Working as quickly as she could, for the light was fading fast, Lael cleaned the wound and applied a mixture of walnut leaves and dock.

  Wincing, Asa asked, “What’s that?”

  “A healing salve.”

  “I ain’t used to such. Reckon they’ll grow back?”

  She looked up, amused. “Your toes?”

  He nodded and winced.

  “Asa Forbes, how much whiskey have you drunk?” He looked shamefaced as she wrapped his foot and said in her most bookish tone, “Man is incapable of regeneration, I’m sorry to say.”

  “I reckon that means no more toes.”

  “You reckon right,” she answered, sitting back on her haunches. Though cleaned, the foot was still a sight, and the blackish skin, hidden now by bandages, troubled her. She would need to consult the medical book Miss Mayella had sent. Her own lack of knowledge continued to confound her. “Do you have enough liquor for your misery?” she asked.

  Grinning, he gestured to a shed. “A right smart supply. I figure if it gets any worse I’ll just chop the whole durn foot off—or see the doctor.”

  Standing, she brushed off her skirt. “You’ll find no doctor in these parts, Asa Forbes. Well, maybe in Lexington, but that’s a far piece.”

  He looked smug, as if he’d caught her in a lie. “There is too a doctor—least he claims to be. But I’m partial to you, Miss Lael.”

  Miss Lael. At least, she thought, he minds his manners despite being rough as a cob. A doctor! She shot him a last look. Perhaps delirium had set in already. She suspected he was courting blood poisoning but was hesitant to say so just yet.

  Staggering to his feet, he hobbled out of the lean-to after her. “I ain’t one to take up with a stranger, doctor or no. Him and his queer ways don’t set right with me.”

  “So you’ve met this man.”

  “Aye, met him but can’t say as I like him.” He looked at her askance as she mounted the mare. “I ain’t got nothin’ to give you for your trouble.”

  “You loaned me your bay when I needed it. We’ll consider that payment enough.” She took her leave as quickly as she could, turning away with a wave of her hand.

  All around her the forest light shifted and settled as she passed, shrouding her with black shadows. She found herself missing Tuck and her own warm hearth. Tired as she was, she rode on and took out a ginseng root to chew to keep up her spirits, but ere long the darkness overtook her and she could go no farther. Soon she found herself benighted in the woods.

  There was nothing to do but wait out the night. The darkness was complete and heavy, pressing in on her like a humid black blanket. She was familiar with these woods, but on her
way to Asa Forbes’s she had noted that the sudden drops and ledges, precipitous enough by day, would be deadly by dark. So she sat on the ground, the mare breathing evenly beside her, and mulled her foolishness.

  She’d failed to pay attention to the setting sun as she made her rounds. In truth, she was so troubled by her visit to the Grubbs cabin, all else had been forgotten. She thought of the boy Titus now. Something had been amiss, some word or action, but what?

  She thought too of Asa Forbes. A doctor, indeed. She tried not to think of Simon, but here in the dark silence broken only by the hoot of an owl, what was to stop her? Unhindered, Lael came face to face with both Simon and her longings. Would she always love him? Perhaps some distant day . . . Nay, she shut her eyes against the flicker of hope that lay in the unknown future. It came unbidden nevertheless. Perhaps . . . one distant day . . . Simon would be free.

  Twice her reverie was broken by the startling trill of a mockingbird. Her senses turned sharp, straining toward the coming dawn. She was not much afraid. Pa’s blood pulsed too strongly in her veins for fear to have its way.

  Tired as she was, she retraced her path to Mourning Grubbs’s ramshackle cabin the next morning, tying the mare to a serviceberry bush well away from the cabin and walking the remainder. She crouched behind a thick curtain of mountain laurel rich with scarlet blooms and waited. Though it was early the chimney belched smoke, and Lael could smell salt pork and bread. Her mouth watered, and she remembered she had eaten nothing since yesterday noon.

  In time the door opened and Titus himself came out, carrying a bucket in the direction of the spring. In and out of the cabin he moved, first with the water, then with a basket of eggs, and finally carrying some sticks of firewood with his good arm.

  Lael waited, hoping to observe she knew not what. But it was an unremarkable morning filled with chores she herself should be doing. And so, backtracking, she untied the mare and returned home.

  34

  Each time she saw her, Lael felt Ma Horn slipping away. Her eyesight was now so poor she had trouble telling some herbs from others and knew this might someday cause a fatal mistake. Where she’d once been so tidy in person and surroundings, she was now unkempt and the tiny cabin cluttered. Some days it took all her strength to leave her chair. And she was more and more in need of her own remedies.

  Yet she was gracious in relinquishing the wisdom of the years to Lael, committing others into her care. “Remember, boneset will nearly always break a fever,” she would say. Or, “Mae Burl’s youngest is hivey and in need of a tonic.” And Lael would go, venturing out again and again, prodded by the weight of her growing responsibilities.

  One day, fatigued after a feverish round of calls, she was in no mood to hear of fresh Indian trouble. “Seems like they always strike after fooling us with a false peace,” Lael lamented.

  “Your pa said there’d be no more trouble betwixt us or them one day,” Ma Horn replied. “But now I wonder if he didn’t mean one or the other of us would have to go.”

  Lael sighed and went to the door, fixing her eyes on the far panoply of purple hills above the fort’s pickets. “Seems like we could all just abide together in peace.”

  She debated whether to ride home in the twilight or stay the night, picturing Tuck running to meet her as she rode in, hungry for some supper scraps. The cow needed to be milked and she’d left some wash out—

  “. . . come to the fort,” Ma Horn’s voice had risen as it always did with fresh news.

  Lael turned, her color high. “What did you say?”

  “I said a doctor has come to the fort.”

  “A doctor? But why?”

  “I never asked him. Seems obvious to me. There’s more people comin’ into this country ever’ day. Enough for the both of you.”

  “But we need a preacher—and a teacher—more than a doctor.” Even as she said it, she recalled her frantic wish for a medical man as she’d dug the lead ball from Simon’s shoulder during the siege. With a shrug she added, “Seems like you and I tend the settlement well enough.”

  “Well, the good Lord knows otherwise, for it’s a doctor He’s sent. He just moved into the old Hayes place. It’s big as cabins go—says he plans to use it to keep real sick folks or ones who need surgery.”

  “Surgery!” Lael exclaimed, rankled that this man—a stranger— would occupy the blockhouse that held some of her dearest childhood memories. It had sat empty ever since her return, and its emptiness seemed fitting somehow, reflecting the emptiness in her heart.

  “So you’ve met him.”

  “Aye, I’ve met him. And he wants to meet you. His name is Ian Justus.”

  She frowned. She hadn’t wanted to know his name—or anything else. “So he’s here—now?”

  “Nay, gone to Lexington to pick up a fancy medicine chest. But he’ll likely be back by dark, should ye stay.”

  That decided it. “I must go.” Furiously, she began packing up her saddlebags and moving toward the door.

  “Mind them fresh Shawnee tracks,” Ma Horn warned. “And ride hard all the way home.”

  She rode hard, her thoughts centered on this man, Ian Justus. Truly, it was a strong-sounding name. But what manner of man would journey into the wilderness to an obscure fort still in danger of Indian attack?

  With all her heart she hoped he was old and infirm. But reason told her it was only a young man’s fortitude and courage that would bring him to such a place. She considered that he was no doctor at all but a ne’er-do-well masquerading as such. The frontier was rife with these frauds, leaving their patients in worse shape than before. Her blood boiled just thinking of them.

  At their first meeting, if there was a meeting, she’d ask to see his medical license. Whoever he was, he’d likely soon grow weary of the hardships and deprivations of fort life and return to wherever it was he’d come from. Though what person, when confronted with Kentucke and its blazing woods in autumn, or the redbud and dogwood’s beauty in spring, could ever leave?

  Nevertheless, he was an outlander. And he wanted to meet her. Well, she would simply not be met.

  Lael was in a shady cove digging ginseng when she heard a horse approach. Hands stained with loamy soil, her dress now wrinkled and dirty, she stayed low. All around her grew maples and basswood and butternut and coffee, their leafy richness further shielding her from view. But she soon saw the horse and rider plain.

  The mount was a chestnut bay and the rival of any owned by Asa Forbes. As for the man, she saw only his backside. His hair was dark and short by settlement standards. Only a small curl at the nape of his neck was tied back with a whang. Broad of shoulder but not overly tall, she judged, by the way he sat in the saddle. But it was his clothes that alerted her to his strangeness. He wore a linen shirt so white as to be a perfect target for an Indian arrow and—

  The Scot!

  She shot straight up, her sang hoe forgotten. She’d last seen him at the corn husking but had been too busy to give him a second thought since. Besides, she’d not thought to see him again. The path he took led straight to her cabin.

  She wondered his reaction had she whooped and sprung out of the sang patch. She sank back down to the ground, out of sight. And then she knew—an inexplicable feeling told her the Scot and the doctor were the same. She let the reality of it trickle over her. Could it be? If so, she couldn’t dodge him forever. Her refusal to go to the fort suddenly seemed childish. Perhaps . . . She wrinkled her nose at the peculiar thought before giving in. Perhaps all her questions could be put to rest by a single visit.

  A windstorm had blown up the night before and the forest floor was deep in chestnuts and acorns and hickory nuts. Ma Horn had a hankering for butternuts, and in two days’ time Lael had gathered several sackfuls for the both of them. Back at the cabin she began the tedious process of taking the hulls off before storing them for winter. She parched some of the acorns for coffee and ground the rest into flour. Every autumn Ma had done the same in case times were rough, whi
ch they invariably were. But she ate up her share of butternuts as soon as she dried them for they were sweet and uncommon and too few to store.

  As she worked she waited, alert to Tuck’s bark. No one called for her services, and the sudden lull made her wonder. Had word of the doctor’s arrival spread so that folks were now taking their ailments to him? With a sinking sensation she pondered the possibility. He was easily accessible, being at the fort, the very heart of the settlement. Folks had reason to go there regularly for supplies. Why not see the doctor at the same time?

  By the time all the nuts were in, her curiosity was at fever pitch. She could not sleep for thinking about him. When she sat down to her simple meals, they seemed tasteless. All the little tasks that had brought her pleasure and fulfillment lost their meaning. Why, she was acting lovestruck instead of vexed! Even sitting on the porch, bathed in the sun of Indian summer and the sweet breath of the fading roses, failed to move her.

  As she loaded the nuts onto the mare she felt queer clear to the pit of her being, as if one of the butterflies Tuck loved to chase had somehow made it down her throat into her stomach. Taking up a small hand mirror, she took a good look at herself then rankled at the action. What did she care if her hair was disheveled or the hem of her dress soiled from work? But she remedied both, splashing cool water on her face for freshening and donning her favorite straw hat.

  Not once did she think of Indian trouble as she rode. The sunlit woods seemed peaceable, and Hackberry Ridge was sunburned and empty as it sloped toward the fort. Once inside, she found the common abuzz with activity. An unusual number of horses and pack animals were outside the sutler’s. With a sinking feeling she turned her head away at the familiar sight of Simon’s mare.

  She’d not seen him since the day of his indecent proposal when she sent him packing. Pine for him she still did, but it was for the Simon of her youth—the boy with hair like fire and an unsullied spirit, not the uncouth man.