by Jan Watson
She shifted her head in small movements—more a tremble than a shake. Her face crumpled. “That hurt more than the money, him willing to hurt me thataway. I think he loves that old hound dog better than he does me.” She wiped another tear. “When I reminded him we got taxes to pay, he got all het up and flung his coffee outen the door. Said he’d take Sassy to market—like that would solve everything. Blowhard! That’s pure selfish. What would we eat on this winter?”
“Men,” Amy said.
Anne rubbed her hand over Amy’s head. She looked at Lilly’s untouched coffee. “Would you druther have tea, Doc Still?”
“I wouldn’t want to be a bother,” Lilly said, using her mountain manners. Making tea would allow Anne time to pull herself together. Serving Lilly’s need would help her to save face.
When the tea was poured and served with biscuits and honey, Anne took the chair across from Lilly. Amy left Lilly’s side, where she’d been stroking the ribbon binding on Glory’s blanket, and climbed up in her mother’s lap.
“Well,” Anne said, “I know in reason you didn’t bring the sheriff by this morning to witness mine and Cletus’s caterwauling. Is there some news about Glory?”
A screeching sound like nails being pried loose from boards interrupted them.
“They’re fixing to move Sassy.” Anne picked up a biscuit dripping with butter and long sweetening. “I’d best go help.”
Lilly and Amy took a seat in the doorway to watch the festivities. Snuggled in her blanket, Glory slept in Lilly’s arms.
Chanis stood partway between the porch and the barn, brandishing a stout stick. Anne chanted, “Soowee—soowee—soowee,” while walking backward with the biscuit held just out of reach of Sassy’s searching mouth. Cletus brought up the rear, one hand resting on Sassy’s broad rump, tiny pink piglets in each of his pockets and one under the bib of his overalls.
Amy clapped her hands in delight. “Me one, Dada. Me one.”
Cletus removed one piglet. He wouldn’t meet Lilly’s eyes when he placed the squirming bundle in Amy’s lap. “This un’s yours, baby girl,” he said.
Chapter 20
The morning was fading away. Lilly and Chanis took the short way back to Skip Rock—in spite of passing the household full of measles.
“It was good of you to help Cletus move Sassy to the barn,” Lilly said.
“It needed doing,” Chanis said. “It got Cletus talking, anyway.”
“Have you known him a long time?”
“Yeah, his folks lived just a whoop and a holler up the road from mine. They was poor as garter snakes. Cletus come up hard—and you know he can’t half hear. His daddy slapped him upside the head one day for taking an extra piece of corn bread. It busted his eardrum.”
“Was he treated?”
“For the ear? Nah, he just learned to duck.”
“Are his folks still around?”
“Influenza took his ma and pa—probably six, seven years ago. Cletus dug their graves himself, wouldn’t let a soul help. He keeps their family plot clean as a whistle.”
Lilly waved when they passed the Coopers’ place. Along one side of the house a line of sunflowers turned their faces toward the sun. Two of the girls played jacks on the porch. They waved back.
“Have you had the measles, Chanis?”
“There’s not much I haven’t had. My mom and her sister had ‘catching parties’ whenever any one of us came down with something. They believed in kids getting things early on—thought it would protect us somehow when we grew up. Is there any truth to that?”
“Some, yes. Eventually scientists will discover ways to protect against most communicable diseases. It’s only a matter of time.”
The sun bore down. Lilly felt wilted, and the heel of her foot ached—probably a stone bruise from walking the ridge. She was glad to reach the clinic. Chanis looked as fresh as when they’d started out this morning.
“Do you think we were right to leave Glory with the Beckers?” Lilly asked.
“What else could be done? Lock her up in the jail? I’d have to take Anne in as well—and her little girl. Then Cletus would be hanging around waiting for Anne to set up housekeeping.” He nodded as if he were pondering the situation. “And Sassy would need a sty.”
Lilly laughed with delight at the picture Chanis was painting. It was good to lighten the moment.
Chanis handed her the satchel he’d carried for her. “Don’t fret. Nobody followed us up there, and when we left out, Cletus was drilling a hole in the barn so’s he could keep a watch on the house—like he couldn’t just look out the door. At the very least this’ll keep him out of the doghouse for a while.”
“Or the pigpen, as the case may be,” Lilly said.
“I got a feeling this whole thing is getting ready to bust wide open,” Chanis said, turning the knob to the clinic door.
“I fear you’re right.” Lilly stepped into her now-spotless office, bidding Chanis good-bye. She could hear murmurs coming from the waiting room. It was half past ten o’clock. She was late, but she needed a minute to herself before the fray began.
At the lavatory sink she ran cold water over a facecloth, then pressed it to her cheeks, her forehead, and the back of her neck. She sponged the hem of her skirt again and another spot near her waist. She was so much more comfortable in her altered garment. Tillie had stitched buttonholes at intervals on the blouse’s hem and sewn buttons to match on the let-out waistband of her skirt. When it was done up, the buttons were cleverly hidden.
Sitting on the closed lid of the commode, Lilly pulled off her shoe and stocking and examined her foot. Just as she’d expected, a purple bruise bloomed painfully on her heel. Funny how things hurt worse once you’d actually seen them. She hopped on one foot to the linen closet, where she kept a tin of salve, and smoothed the greasy ointment on. There was nothing known to be more healing than the fragrant yellow resin from the buds of the balm of Gilead mashed and stewed in melted lard. She never made the salve without snippets of Scripture running through her mind. So powerful, the words from Jeremiah: “When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me. . . . Is not the Lord in Zion? . . . Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?”
It was a tribute to her mother and to her Sunday school teachers that Lilly had committed so many verses to memory. Every Sunday there’d been a new verse to learn before the next class, and every Saturday evening her mother listened to her recitation. No memory verse—no supper. Lilly learned easily. She never went to bed hungry.
A smile played about her lips as she massaged her foot. Her mother was not overly strict. Lilly, as well as her brothers and sisters, had gotten by with more than they should have, unless Daddy John was home. But when it came to honoring the Scripture, Mama was a stickler. Lilly was thankful for a mother who loved and lived the Word.
She wrapped her heel in gauze before putting her stocking and shoe back on, then washed her hands again and tidied up her hair. She didn’t look any worse for the morning’s wear. Tillie Tippen was right. Her face had that expectant-mother glow.
Oh, she wished Tern would get home. She didn’t want to be busting out all over before she saw him next. She should go by the post office; often the postmaster had information beyond the confines of Skip Rock. Maybe there’d be some news about the mining disaster in Canada. If the men had been rescued, Tern could be on his way home. She prayed so.
Lilly worked through lunch. Timmy came by for a post-coin-swallowing check. He was fit as a fiddle and left the office sporting a clean sling and with instructions for gentle—Lilly emphasized gentle—exercising of his arm and hand to prevent joint stiffness. “Five more weeks and we can leave the splints off,” she said in answer to a posited question. He bounced out the door, coins jingling in his pocket, on his way to the commissary to pick up a newspaper for her. Maybe the Herald would have an update, save her a trip to the post office.
Hannah brought her a lunch tray. “You need to eat, D
oc Still. I’ll keep the natives at bay for a few minutes.” She dragged a side chair close to Lilly. “I noticed you were limping. Why not put your feet up while you eat?”
Lilly did just that, resting her feet and relishing the mellow taste of creamy yellow cheese on lightly buttered wheat bread, the sunny taste of sugar-dusted blueberries, and the full aroma of the steaming tea. Often she didn’t realize how hungry or how tired she was until she forced herself to rest. Caring for her patients always seemed more urgent than caring for her own needs. That would have to change now that there was a baby on the way. If she could just hold on until Ned finished his training, her workload would halve.
She rounded her shoulders and let them drop, releasing tension. “Physician, heal thyself,” she said, popping a blueberry into her mouth.
Timmy jumped over the doorsill. “Here’s your paper, Doc, and your change and an oatmeal cookie the lady at the register sent you. It’s got raisins.”
“Open your mouth, Timmy; let me see if there’s a dime hiding in there.”
Timmy dropped his head. “I ain’t likely to pull that stunt again, Doc. I learnt my lesson good.”
“I was teasing you.” She handed him a nickel from the change. “Thank you for the paper.” Taking the wax-paper wrap from the still-warm cookie, Lilly broke it in half. “Help me eat this while I look at the news.”
Timmy looked over her shoulder as she turned the pages. His piece of cookie disappeared in three bites. “Anything interesting in there, Doc?”
“Not much.”
“You need anything else?”
“No, not for now.”
Timmy licked crumbs from the cookie wrapper. “Say, Doc, you know that man who was here that time?”
Lilly folded the paper and put it aside. Timmy had a crumbly oatmeal mustache. “What man?”
“’Member the one that wore his hair like an Indian, but he wasn’t? ’Member he had his hair pulled back in a braid?”
“I do remember him. Why?”
“I seen him again this morning. It was way early—don’t tell Mommy, okay? I was supposed to be taking the cream to the station and coming straight back. You know they open up way early so’s they get the cream straight from the cow. Mommy said, ‘No dillydallying, young man.’ But I sort of wanted to see if Mr. Tippen had got your window fixed.”
Lilly’s neck tingled. “Where was he, Timmy?”
“I can show you.”
Lilly stepped outside with Timmy. The boy raised his uninjured arm and pointed straight across the street to the alley between the commissary and the cream station, just as Chanis had done.
“He was crouched down in the alley there. When he seen me looking, he acted like he was picking something up off the ground—like maybe a coin or something. When he went to straighten up, he caught the brim of his hat on that window ledge there. I seen that long snake of his hair spill out.” Timmy twisted side to side. “It made me feel funny—like a goose was walking on my grave.”
Back inside, Lilly offered the rest of the cookie to him.
“Anyways,” he said between bites, “I just wanted to tell you that.”
“I think Sheriff Clay would like to hear about what you saw, Timmy.”
“Really? I want to be him when I grow up.” He crumpled the cookie wrapper and tossed it toward the waste can. “Daddy says he’d like to see me on the right side of the law.”
“If you see that man again, don’t talk to him.”
“Is he a bad guy? Did he break your window?” He picked up the wad of wax paper from the floor and dropped it in the can. “Do you go to jail if you break a window?”
“No, a person doesn’t go to jail just for breaking a window.”
“That’s good, else half my buddies would be in the hoosegow.”
“Hold still,” Lilly said, wiping crumbs from his face.
He squirmed away. “At least you didn’t spit on your finger like Mommy does. Reckon I’ll just mosey on over to the jail. Maybe Sheriff Clay will let me look through the bars.”
As Lilly settled in to finish the afternoon with more patient cares and thus more charts, she fought the urge to pull the window blind. If someone was watching, he’d have to come closer than the alley to be a threat. Tomorrow she’d bring Kip to work. He was the very best watchman.
Home was a welcome sight when it finally came into view. Lilly had almost given in to her sore foot and asked Mr. Tippen for a ride. He’d stopped his wagon on the road as she passed by to ask if she’d seen any termites about. She could have laughed at the thought after the way he bombed the clinic. “Not a one,” she said.
“Good,” he’d said. “I’m off, then. Got to see to the cows before supper.”
Lilly purposely hid her limp on the walk home. She didn’t want folks fussing over her. All she wanted in the world was for Tern to come home and rub the soreness from her feet. Silly vanity—wishing niceties to come her way when there was so much sorrow all around.
She thought of Anne. Would her husband’s gambling cause them to lose their place? She’d had to bite her tongue to keep from offering to pay their back taxes herself. It might be a poor excuse of a farm, but it was theirs.
She wondered why Anne put up with Cletus—why she stayed. But she knew the answer, of course. Staying was what women did. Partly to save face—mountain women were so very proud—and partly because there were no other options.
As she walked, her mind wandered to the poorest place she’d ever seen. She’d been in Skip Rock for only a short time when, one overcast day, she was called out to deliver a baby. The man of the house had pulled her up behind him, and the horse took off in a trot. She’d clung to the man’s back all the way up and across the ridge dubbed Devil’s Shoestring, scared within an inch of her life at the steep drop-off on either side of the narrow crest. One misstep and the horse would plunge them all to sudden death.
“Hold tight as a tick,” Mr. Dweezil Pratt had said. “It’s about to get a tad rough.”
Lilly found that was a severe understatement when the horse locked knees and slid them all the way to the bottom of the hill, shale cracking under its hooves like ice on a mud puddle. After that, things got a “tad” easier as their sure-footed mount picked his way upstream in a mostly dry creek bed. She was glad they weren’t making the trip in a rainy season.
Lilly thought she was looking at a corncrib when at last they reached the rough-hewn cabin surrounded by a dense forest of trees. Mr. Pratt handed her down to a broad-shouldered, barefoot boy who swung her to her feet, then, without so much as a word, began to wipe foamy lather from the horse’s withers.
Four skimpily dressed children with wildly unkempt hair spilled out of the door. There were no windows, but with cracks in the walls big enough to pitch a cat through, one could easily see in or out.
The stoop was a large, rectangular limestone slab creating a high step to the doorsill. The main house was one square room with a loft and a packed dirt floor. A chink-rock fireplace took up the wall across from the door. A double bed was pushed up against another wall. A few broken-down chairs and an oak pedestal table were the only other furnishings. Some limp clothing hung from pegs on the walls.
A dogtrot led to the kitchen, where there was a stove, a wash bench, and an open cupboard holding plates and cups and a few jars of canned vegetables, mostly green beans and tomatoes. One shelf sported a pasteboard box cut in half. The box held bars of lye soap. A basket of long-eyed, withered potatoes was pushed under the lowest shelf alongside a blue twenty-five-gallon bucket of lard. Lilly shuddered to think of the effort required to haul that lard can across the back of Devil’s Shoestring.
Three shotguns and a rifle made a tepee in the corner. The hides of various animals were tacked, curing, along one wall. Lilly recognized the skins of a beaver and a mink. It seemed early in the year for trapping. Maybe these animals had natural deaths or maybe Mr. Pratt had shot them. She knew one thing: they were decidedly unsanitary. And she knew another: they
would cure better out of doors. Her poor Daddy John had to dry his hides on the back side of the barn out of sight of his girls. Even her mother couldn’t bear to see his handiwork. Hides done right brought good money, though.
That day in a stranger’s kitchen, Lilly suddenly realized she was the only person in the house. Where had all the children gone, and where was the expectant mother? Back through the narrow dogtrot and with a little leap down to the stoop, she saw the children gathering around their father. He was doling out penny candy, one stick at a time. The littlest one sat astride a sister’s hip, making give-me motions with her fingers smacking her palms. A smile stretched ear to ear on the little one’s face when Mr. Pratt broke a stick in half and stuck it in her greedy paw. So it appeared there were five children counting the older boy.
“Mr. Pratt,” she called out from the stoop, “where is Mrs. Pratt?”
“My, my,” he said. “I near forgot all about her. Geraldine! Where you at? I brung the doc.”
Lilly was becoming decidedly uneasy. She should have asked more questions before she agreed to come along to this place six miles from nowhere. This should be Mrs. Pratt’s sixth delivery. Unless she was severely run-down or ill, her labor probably wouldn’t last long—why wasn’t she already abed? Short, rapid deliveries could be as dangerous to the baby as overlong ones.
As Lilly watched, a young, stout-looking woman emerged from a scraggly garden bordered by a broken-down fence. She carried a heavy-bladed, short-handled, one-eyed hoe.
“Don’t bust a gut, Dweezil,” she said, continuing across the yard. “It’ll be a time yet.”
The children, except for the biggest boy, followed her across the yard like ducklings after a hen. “You’uns wait out here for a spell,” she said to the children. “I need to visit with the lady.”