Angel of the Cove

by Sandra Robbins

  On the third afternoon after being back at home, Anna prepared for another long session of study with Granny. They’d worked in the garden all morning, and this was the first time they’d taken a break from their everyday chores. Anna sat at the table where the herbs hung on the wall. Her open journal lay before her, and her pencil skimmed across the page as she tried to record everything Granny said.

  Straightening from leaning over the table, Granny propped her hands on her hips and stretched her back. “So, how you feelin’ ’bout them yarbs? Think you’re a-larnin’ ’em?”

  Anna looked up from writing in her journal and nodded. “I feel much more at ease than I did the first day I came, but I’m more comfortable just watching you use them on a patient. I still worry I might make a mistake. How long did it take before you felt like you knew what you were doing?”

  Granny walked over to the chairs in front of the fireplace and pulled one to the table. She eased down beside Anna. “I don’t know if’n I feel that way even after all these years. But I larnt a long time ago that the Lord’s in control. I jest turn ev’ry birthin’ over to Him. I’m there to let ’im work through me.”

  “I want to be the same way, Granny. I pray every night that I’ll be more like you, but I still have a long way to go in gaining confidence. I know a lot can go wrong when a woman’s having a baby. I wonder how I can handle that when it happens.”

  The pencil slipped from Anna’s fingers to the journal. Hoping Granny would dismiss her greatest fear with some witty words, Anna gazed up at her. Granny’s somber expression frightened her even more.

  “It’s always pos’ble somethin’s gonna go wrong during childbirth,” she said. “That’s why I thought we’d jest set a spell, ’cause there’s some thangs I need to tell you and you’ll prob’bly want to be a-sittin’ when I talk about it.”

  Anna’s eyes grew wide. “Have I done something wrong, Granny?”

  Granny laughed and patted her arm. “Lands, no, child. You done a good job. ’Specially takin’ care of the mother after the baby comes. That’s a mighty important time.”

  “I know.”

  “That’s why I try to keep thangs clean. Always remember to wash your hands a lot and put clean bedding on after the birth. We gotta be real careful with the mother ’cause we don’t want no infection to set up. Most women what die in childbirth act’ly die from puerperal fever.”

  Reminding herself to check with Uncle Charles about the correct spelling later, Anna grabbed the pencil and wrote down the word. “What’s that?”

  “The first month after birth they’s all kinds of germs kin git in the mother’s womb then jest go all through her body. Ain’t much I can do if that happens, so’s I try to head if off at the beginnin’ by keepin’ the birth room clean as I can. And like I said, you been doin’ a good job of that.”

  Anna’s skin warmed with pleasure at the compliment. “Thank you, Granny.”

  Granny straightened in her chair. “But they’s lots more you need to know. So far the birthin’s you’ve seen been real easy ones.”

  Anna tilted her head and thought about the babies she’d seen born. “Easy? I thought Gracie never would have her baby.”

  Granny shook her head. “That ain’t what I’m a-talkin’ about. Gracie’s time warn’t near as long as you thought it was. Sometimes it’s hours and hours. Don’t know why. Some women jest take longer. But sometimes there’s real problems, and I want you prepared if’n we have one.”

  Anna swallowed back the fear that rose inside her. “What kind of problems?”

  Granny hesitated a moment. “Well, most times everythin’ works out—maybe nine times outta ten you got no problems. Then along comes one you wish hadn’t happened. Those are the time I’m a-talkin’ ’bout.”

  Anna tightened her fingers on the pencil, poised her hand over the journal, and took a deep breath. “All right. I’m ready.”

  “Ev’ry once in a while you gonna have a breech birth. Now they’s diff’rent kinds, and you need to know what to do.” Granny hesitated. “Fact is most times there ain’t much you can do. If the baby is a-comin’ faceup or crosswise, it’s real bad.”

  Anna frowned and wrote the terms in her journal. “Faceup I understand, but how will I know if the baby’s crosswise?”

  “You’ll see the arms or the feet a-comin’ first. If this happens, the first thing you try to do with a faceup or crosswise birth is to turn the baby. I’ll show you later how you can try on the mother’s stomach by a-pressin’, but if’n the baby’s settled, it prob’ly ain’t gonna work.”

  “What do you do then?”

  “Then you gotta try to turn ’im in the birth canal. You understand?”

  “Yes. I’ve seen my father do it with our animals on the farm.”

  “Good. But it’s a diff’rent feelin’ when you gotta do it for a woman. You jest pray the good Lord’s gonna guide your hands.” Granny thought for a moment before she went on. “If’n you cain’t turn the baby, there’s one more thang I’ve tried, but it don’t always work.”

  “What’s that?”

  Granny pointed to the bedroom. “I sewed me a stuffed baby doll one time so’s I could practice. When we git through, I’ll go git it and teach you. But before I do, there’s somethin’ else you need to know about breech births.”

  Granny knelt beside her chair and reached underneath the table. When she stood, she held a long box in her hands. She placed it on the table and stared at it for a moment.

  In Granny’s eyes Anna detected a deep sorrow. Whatever was in the box was not something Granny wanted to show her. She didn’t want to see it, either, but she knew she must. Anna leaned forward and touched Granny’s hand. “What is that?”

  Granny lifted the top of the box. Anna recoiled at the horrible instrument lying inside. Never in her life had she seen anything like the long iron rod with the curved hook at the end. Granny pulled it from the box and held it up.

  Her lips trembled, and Anna realized Granny held death in her hands. “When nothing works to deliver the baby, you hafta save the mother’s life.”

  Anna’s mouth gaped open. “What do you do with it?”

  Granny’s creased face turned white. Anna wondered if she was remembering past experiences with the horrible instrument. Granny tried to speak and cleared her throat. “You gotta pull the baby’s body apart so’s the mother can git rid of it.” The droning words cut a swath through Anna’s heart, leaving a hollowed-out feeling in its wake.

  A queasy feeling washed over Anna, and she jammed her fist into her mouth to keep from losing everything she’d eaten all day. When the wave of nausea passed, she shook her head and recoiled. “Oh, Granny. I could never do that. It’s sickening.” Her shrill voice echoed in the room.

  Granny, anger flashing in her eyes, turned back to Anna. “You said you wanted to larn about helpin’ mothers during childbirth. Well, sometimes you hafta help ’em by savin’ their lives. When you see a woman in agony and know she’s a-gonna die if you don’t do somethin’, you do what you hafta do. Now I know they ain’t gonna use this here instrument in New York, but you ain’t there yet. When you in the mountains all alone with a woman who’s about to die, you hafta do what you can to save her life. Do you understand?”

  Shame replaced the queasy feeling. Granny was right. Uncle Charles once told her the hardest part of being a doctor was having to watch a patient die. He said when he was losing a patient, he tried everything he knew to keep the person alive. Now she would be expected to do the same thing.

  Anna gulped a deep breath and nodded. “All right, Granny.”

  Granny stared at the hook as if it held her in its spell. “I’m jest an ole mountain woman. Don’t know much ’cept what my ma taught me. But I did tell Doc one time about having to do this with a baby. He told me I performed a craniotomy. I practiced on saying that word for a long time so’s I’d remember it. Jest seemed like if I was gonna hafta do it, I oughter know what it was called.”

 
; Anna took the hook from Granny’s hand and laid it back in the box with a shudder. “Well, maybe you’ve used it for the last time.” She slipped the box back under the table and smiled at Granny. “Now, how about getting that baby doll? I’d sure like to know what the alternative is to using that thing.”

  Granny pulled her apron up and wiped at her eyes. “Be back in a minute.” She stopped at the door and faced Anna. “The first time you went with me to Laura’s for her baby, I knowed you was a-gonna be a good nurse to women in childbirth. Maybe the Lord’s gonna lead you to stay in the Cove and work with our women.”

  When Anna said nothing, Granny left the room.

  Within moments Granny returned with a rag doll dressed in a yellow calico dress. Small pieces of brown yarn had been sewn onto the head for hair. Embroidered wide blue eyes, small nostrils, and a smiling mouth decorated the face.

  Granny laid the doll on the table. “I made this here doll myself, and I’ve used it a lot of times to practice on.”

  Anna studied the doll that looked as if it would appeal to any little girl. “How has this helped you with a breech baby?”

  “I’ll show you.” Granny placed one hand at the bottom of the doll’s abdomen and the other at the top. She pushed upwards with the lower hand while rotating the top hand to the side and downward. “You git your left hand positioned around the baby’s head at the top and twist downward counterclockwise while your right hand pushes up from the bottom of the mother’s belly. The first thing you gotta do is lift the baby’s bottom out from where it’s a-sittin’ and try to move him crosswise. After a few minutes if he’s moved to that position, let the mother rest a bit ’fore you start again. Then put your hands back in the same position and turn again to try and git the head to move down.”

  Anna nodded. “Does this usually work?”

  Granny sighed. “I wish it did, but sometimes it just ain’t meant to happen. Could be something’s blocking the way, or just that the baby don’t want to move.” Granny stepped back from the table. “Now you try.”

  Anna placed her hands where Granny’s had been moments before and tried to perform the movements the way Granny had done. After a few minutes she glanced up, and her hands froze in position. Tears sparkled in Granny’s eyes. “What’s the matter? Did I do something wrong?”

  Granny wiped at a tear that trickled down her cheek. “You ain’t done nothing, darlin’. I was just rememberin’ something I try not to think about.”

  Anna released the doll and reached for Granny’s hand. “I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

  Granny turned away from the table and sank down in one of the chairs by the fireplace. Anna eased down next to her and waited for Granny to speak, but she appeared to be lost in thought. After a moment she took a deep breath.

  “You remember I told you I had a daughter that died?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, since you been here, I cain’t help thinkin’ ’bout her all the time. She never did like livin’ in the Cove. Wanted to see the world, she said. This feller come to our valley one summer, and he promised her all kinds of things if’n she’d go with him over to Gatlinburg to live. I didn’t want her to go, but she run off and married him. Just left me a note tellin’ me maybe she’d see me agin someday.”

  Anna’s heart constricted and tears filled her eyes. “Oh, Granny. I’m so sorry. Did you ever see her again?”

  “She come home ’bout a year later. Her husband turned out to be a right bad feller just like I thought. He stayed drunk a lot, and he’d beat her for no reason. When she got here, she was sick and expectin’ a baby. She’d saved enough money from takin’ in washin’ to pay a man to bring her home. When she got here, she didn’t do nothin’ but sleep for two days.”

  Anna reached over and laced her fingers with Granny’s. “I know you were glad to have her back.”

  “I was.” Granny sighed. “Then came the night she started havin’ the baby. He was a breech baby, and I tried everything I knowed to turn him, but he wouldn’t move.”

  “What happened?” Anna could barely whisper the words.

  Granny’s eyes narrowed, and she stared into space as if she had traveled back in time to that horrible night. “I told her I had to use the hook and git the baby out of her. She begged and pleaded for me not to. She wanted her baby to have a chance to live. She told me if I killed her baby she’d hate me for the rest of her life.”

  Tears ran down Anna’s face, and she tightened her grip on Granny’s hand. “How terrible.”

  Granny tilted her head to one side. “I knowed what I needed to do, but I couldn’t. Not with Deborah a-beggin’ me to save her child.” She shook her head. “I shouldn’t have listened to her. By morning they was both dead, and I knowed I had killed them.”

  Anna dropped to her knees beside Granny and threw her arms around her. “You can’t think like that. No, you didn’t.”

  “Yes, I did. I could have saved Deborah. Even if she had hated me for it, at least she’d be alive.” She reached down, put her finger under Anna’s chin, and tilted her face up. “I wanted to tell you this ’cause someday you may have to make a decision like that. Do what you have to do so that at least the mother or the child will live. Promise me, Anna.”

  Anna stared at Granny through her tears. “I promise,” she whispered. Then she laid her head in Granny’s lap and cried for the anguish Granny had suffered for the decision she’d made years ago, for Deborah who gave her life in hopes her child would live, and for a baby who never had the chance to know what his life could have been.

  The afternoon lesson had left Anna shaken. She’d attended each birth as if nothing could go wrong. Thankfully nothing had yet, but she’d never make the mistake of not recognizing the dangers again.

  Her mother told her there was nothing greater she could do than help women at the most dangerous time of their life—when they were giving birth. Now Granny had opened her eyes to what could happen. She prayed she was strong enough to cope with what might lie in the future.

  The next afternoon Anna stood at the kitchen table and scooped the last of the cooled jam from inside the pan. With quick movements she ladled it into the jar on the table.

  “That’s the last one fer today,” Granny said as she screwed on the top. “Mmm. This jam’s gonna taste mighty good when winter comes.”

  Since coming to the Cove, Anna had worked alongside Granny each day to prepare for the coming winter. Although the days were warm and food was plentiful, the cold days weren’t far off. Then Granny, as well as all the Cove residents, would rely on what they’d laid by in the summer. Rows of canned beans and peas lined the walls of the root cellar along with the sacks of ramps and buckets of dried apples. The sweet jam would be next.

  Anna pushed a strand of hair out of her face and propped her hands on her hips. “Well, Granny, it looks like you’re gonna be eating well this winter.”

  Granny ran a spoon around the inside of the pan to collect a scoop of jam. She popped the tasty morsel in her mouth and smiled. “That’s good. I shore do thank the good Lord fer providin’ my needs. I larnt a long time ago that if’n you do a little bit ev’ry day, by the end of the summer, you’ll be surprised at what you done.”

  Anna nodded. “That’s wise. Gather all the vegetables from the garden every morning, cook what you need for the day, and preserve the rest. I’ll remember that.”

  Granny dropped the spoon into the empty pot. “That’s jest the way the mountain women do. Guess your ma did the same.”

  “She did, but she had a larger garden. We would put up a bushel of peas or beans at one time. And we had hogs and cattle. So we always had lots of meat to get us through. I’ve noticed the Cove people don’t raise cattle.”

  Granny shook her head. “Naw, but ev’ry farm has a milk cow or two. Most jest raise hogs and chickens. We got all kinds of wild game here, so that’s ’bout all the meat we get. ’Cept of course hams and bacon. Ev’ry farmer tries to raise a hog t
o kill.” She chuckled to herself. “Hog killin’ time be real excitin’. Ev’rybody helps each other. I don’t raise no hogs, so folks give me hams and bacon for he’pin’ with a birth.”

  Anna set the jam pan in the dry sink and poured some water into it. “I wondered where the meat in your smokehouse came from. I knew you didn’t have hogs.”

  “If’n you were here in fall, you could go with me to all the hog killin’s and have a great time.”

  “It sounds like fun.”

  Granny pulled a basket from the pegs by the back door and began to set the jars in it. “Well, we gonna dig taters in a few weeks. The ground where they’s planted is beginnin’ to bust open. So them hills are ’bout ready to be dug. And then the corn be ready after that.”

  Anna took the basket from Granny. “Lots to look forward to. I’ll put this in the root cellar for you.”

  A frown pulled at Granny’s brows as she rubbed her hip. “Thanks, darlin’. It’s getting’ harder for me to git down there. You shore have been a big he’p to me.”

  Anna studied the woman who’d been so kind to her since she arrived in the Cove. “Not nearly as much as you’ve helped me, Granny. Thank you for everything.”

  Granny waved her hand in dismissal. “Go on and get that to the root cellar. Then we gonna eat a bite before we head out.”

  Surprise rippled through Anna. “Head out for where?”

  “We jest been talkin’ ’bout how the Cove people have to get ready for winter. Well, Laura Ferguson still ain’t a-feelin’ well. I thought we might go over and see how we can he’p her out this afternoon.”

  The thought of Ted and Lucy brought a smile to Anna’s face. “Oh, good. I’ve been wanting to see the children.”

  Granny chuckled and shook her head. “I reckon you ’bout the only one ever been able to make them young’uns behave. They shore did take a likin’ to you.”

  Anna called over her shoulder as she pushed the back door open. “I liked them too.”

  Outside Anna hurried to the root cellar and deposited the jam, then turned back to the house. In the backyard she paused and let her gaze wander. Granny’s rooster Jasper strutted across the yard, his head cocked to the side. Anna looked around for Jewel, the setting hen, but she was nowhere in sight.