Forgetting Tabitha: An Orphan Train Rider (20 page)

In the far corner of the room sat a leather chair, draped across it was a cabled ivory afghan. Beside the chair stood a bombay style stone top walnut dresser that was elegantly carved with a leaf motif. Its matching side table was to my right and it held a decanter of water, presumably for me. Flowered taffeta draperies flanked the windows and the colorful braided rug indicated to me that this was the home of a woman. Her décor was stylish and sensible.

I poured from the decanter and took a sip of the cool water, my throat throbbed and swallowing was difficult but not impossible.

A woman entered the room and once again my fingers tingled with anxiety and I dropped the glass.

“Where am I?” I asked, my voice shaking as I failed recognize the woman tending me.

“There, there child, you will be all right. We are taking very good care of you. Edmund and the judge wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Edmund, who is Edmund?” I didn’t know anyone by the name of Edmund and as for a judge, did this mean I was in trouble?

“Edmund is my son, as well as your friend. The judge is a friend as well. Edmund found you, and asked if we could care for you here in our home while you recovered.”

Speaking was difficult on account of the wounds in my throat, so the woman gentled me with her hand and pulled the cabled afghan from its home on the chair and laid it across my lap. She put me in a sitting position and began wetting a clean white towel in the basin of water she carried with her and sat on the side table. The warmth felt nice and her gentle demeanor put me at ease. She hummed a tune I didn’t recognize as she proceeded to give me a sponge bath starting with my face and neck. When she reached my torso, she sought my eyes before continuing.

“Gert, darling, you were badly hurt. If it pains you too much to look please, dear, close your eyes and let me tend these wounds. I have much experience and promise to be gentle.”

The first wrapping this woman pulled off my chest was painless, but those that followed had me wincing. I wanted to look at my body and therefore opened my eyes. I was covered in gaping wounds, although they appeared to be healing which, this woman said, was the reason they itched. There were no active bleeds and after the woman cleansed them, she administered a salve that was thick and gooey. She bathed me for a half hour, explaining she would allow me to get some rest before returning to do my back.

My back? Was my back full of gouges as well? I couldn’t imagine what happened, but she called me Gert, and yes, I remember that as my name. I remember the crisp way the ‘t’ rolled off my tongue cementing my name.

I searched my memory for anything else having to do with me, a bedroom perhaps, a family, personal effects, but it was all in vain.

Hopeless I closed my eyes, letting exhaustion soak through my bones.

Chapter 16 Edmund

“Mother, Father, please, I beg of you to allow Gert to stay with us for her follow up care.”

“Who is she Edmund? How are the two of you acquainted?” They were suspicious at first of my relationship with her.

“She is a close friend who has fallen on hard times recently; she has lost both of her parents and works at the Ale House in town.” The less I said the better.

“How has she been providing for herself, where does she live?” Mother asked.

“The Ale House provides her with room and board. She would be too vulnerable there now, Mother, she isn’t safe. We must allow her to reside in the guest room until she resumes her memory and strength.”

“Didn’t the judge offer to care for her?” Father asked.

“Yes, Father, he did. But I thought because of Mother’s hands-on experience as a hospital volunteer perhaps she would be better off staying with us, besides we have the room.”

When they asked further about the nature of my friendship with Gert I lied, stating I tutored her occasionally because her job no longer allowed her time for school. My mother and father consulted in private on the matter and decided it would be Christian and charitable to take on such a case, so they permitted Gert to use our guest room and took on the responsibility of her care. Whether or not they suspected Gert’s secondary occupation as a prostitute they never mentioned it, however, to them that would make the undertaking even more Christian.

The woman I loved lay stripped of her dignity and near death in the room next to mine. I could hear her crying out in pain at night and whimpering during the day. Her torment was both physical and psychological, I wanted to go to her, slide in bed with her under a cocoon of covers, wrapping her in my embrace and kissing her worries away. Some say I am too young for feelings so intense, but regardless of my age, my heart was breaking. It was visceral, this feeling of protection and agitation for Gert all at the same time. If only she let me help her. If she only understood I didn’t look at her as charity, I just couldn’t stand to see her spreading her legs and servicing men aside from me any longer. She told me more than once that if it bothered me we could no longer be friends. It did bother me, but rather than part ways and lose her influence in my life I tolerated what she did. Now that she lay in and out of consciousness, confused and torn I wish I was more insistent, less tolerant and adamant actually that she quit her days as a prostitute. I could have saved her.

We had a psychologist specializing in trauma to see her and then help us understand what was going on. He called her condition ‘amnestic syndrome’ or amnesia. Her case of amnesia was ‘retrograde’ meaning she had an impaired ability to recall past events and information that was previously familiar. It was possible she could recall childhood experiences that were deeply ingrained in her memories; however her brain blocked anything recent due to both the physical and emotional trauma she experienced. The doctor explained to us that her memory loss was isolated, but that it wouldn’t change Gert’s intelligence, or her awareness and personality. He went on to say seizures, tremors, and difficulty with small motor movements were possible and to be on the lookout for them.

“Allow me to spend time with her Mother, please.”

“Son, she needs time to recover for a few days first. She remembers nothing at all, only recollecting her name.” Sarah feared the presence of a man might set her back and because this young lady was already so anxious she thought it best she did the tending. Sometimes Aunt Edna helped as well; tending to her while she used the bathroom was a particular challenge.

“What if she doesn’t remember me?” I cast the thought aside; she had to remember me.

I spent my time deciphering who among Gert’s clients would have any vendetta towards her. Who would beat her so savagely and why; she never hurt anyone.

I loved her, I knew this now. It took me a little while to recognize this feeling, the tingling in the pit of my stomach, the longing and then the breaking of my heart when seeing her lying beaten and unconscious. I thought my feelings lay in wait for Mary; I obsessed over her non-stop. Mary in fact was the reason I went to Gert in the first place. I was sexually frustrated and took it upon myself to find help. I also wanted lessons in order to be a better man for Mary who I imagined as my future wife.

Gert obliged me in every way possible. She exuded patience when I finished too soon and taught me how to clench myself at the base so I could proceed for longer periods of time. She allowed me to kiss her, something most of her other callers weren’t permitted, and our kisses were full of tenderness and something else. She taught me to use gentle sweeps of my lips and to keep them moist at all times. She taught me the art of massage, beginning with warm, scented rose oil that she infused herself. I started at the base of her skull, taking my time and working my way down her muscles with soothing, tapping, and kneading strokes. She taught me to use my thumbs and fingertips, working them in deep circles into the thickest part of her muscles for the greatest relief of muscle tension. I followed by flattening my hands across her back and shaking rapidly, loosening the blood, getting it flowing and creating energy.

When she returned the favor on me, I was in heaven, except for the smelling like roses part.

This woman was strong and uncommonly brave; she had been on her own for nearly a year, creating a life and supporting herself. Granted I hated what she did and how she earned a living, I refused to be a martyr, as she accused me on one occasion when I asked her to allow me to help her.

“But Gert, there is so much more for you to become!” I pleaded with her to find another way before she got hurt or contracted syphilis, but I was unable to get through. I suspected she was younger than the age she proclaimed to be but wasn’t going to press the issue with her now.

An investigation was underway. The sheriff had been contacted and was meeting with the judge today. I had an appointment with him after lunch to see what progress if any had been made to catch the rapist.

Josiah and I walked the streets, looking for anyone new in town. We asked the tavern owner if he had seen anyone new in or out and except for the deputy this month everyone was a regular. The tavern owner did try to look out for Gert, fearing for her naivety and he was beyond words when we told him what happened to her.

Surely the sheriff would be speaking with all his deputies and they would continue the search until he was found. They assured us they were doing everything possible.

Until then, I had to find Gert a new home. Perhaps she would be my betrothed. I loved her and would propose that we become engaged at once, we could marry in three and a half years’ time when I was eighteen. I counted my money and had more than enough for a down payment on a suitable ring. I normally would be asking her for an opinion on such a topic but because she was unavailable I needed to seek Mary’s advice.

“Good day, Auntie Edna!” I chimed in through the window, catching Edna kneading her famous beer bread.

“Eddie, come in, come in. Sit. Let me get you a drink.” She wiped her hands on her apron.

“Oh don’t go to any trouble for me, Aunt Edna; I only came to see Mary, is she home today?” I looked around the tidy home but there was no sign of Mary downstairs.

“She is home, upstairs studying I believe. Go on up.” She nodded towards the stairs.

I made my way out of the kitchen but first Edna asked me about Gert, “no change” I said feeling forlorn.

I approached Mary’s room, knocking lightly, but when she didn’t hear me I opened it a crack and peered in. What I saw before me was shocking. Mary was looking at her profile in the looking glass, her hand was gently pressed on her belly which indeed looked swollen.

She stammered and shuddered when she realized I was peering in the room and I feared she would holler and scream at me again as she had been doing. I suppose I had really gotten on her nerves, she was more apt to tell me to get lost these days than to invite me into chat.

“I am terribly sorry.” I began closing the door but she ran to me and pulled me in the room.

She looked down and shook her head. “What am I to do?” It appeared as she had been walking small recently, hunching over and keeping her arms tight at her sides, I read her body language incorrectly, for I thought it was insecurity, having no notion until this very moment that it was so no one would notice the child growing within. But upon seeing her in her naked, shift pulled up and over her budding belly, it was impossible not to notice.

“So it’s true, then, or was I just imagining you looking as if you were with child?”

“It is true.” Mary looked embarrassed, and refused to meet my penetrating gaze.

“How far along are you?” I asked sternly.

“Seventeen weeks to the day.”

“Am I to presume Scotty is the father of this child?”

“Yes.”

“Does he know?”

“No, he left right after our first time, well, our only time.”

I was fuming mad. What was with the men in this godforsaken town? One brutally beating the woman I love and the other impregnating my cousin whom I thought I loved.

“He is a bastard. He had no right to do this to you, was it forced? We shall find him and have him arrested at once.”

“God, Eddie, No! I wanted this. I told you, I love him. I invited him into my bed and not only allowed it but asked for it. Besides, I am not a child anymore! I am nineteen, old enough to make my own decisions.”

I swallowed back the bile rising in my throat. “But he should have known better, he is a man for God sakes; he knows how to protect you from such things. Where is he, I will bring him to you at once.” The starch from my cravat was irritating my nose something awful forcing me to sneeze.

“Eddie, listen to me. He left town after the animals were murdered at the Wrights’.”

“I’ll bet he did,” I said, stepping lightly around the topic hoping she didn’t sense my unease.

“I realize Scotty isn’t as dapper and refined as you,” she assessed my fine clothing, from the velvet collar on my frock to the turned up sleeves on my crisp white dress shirt that was tucked into a bold plaid trouser pant, “but he is no murderer. He actually birthed one of the calves and then revived it when they thought it was dead. The Wrights sent him away until the dust settles. They believe him, and so do I.”

“Hmmm. Well, no matter, he must find out about the child. Unless.” I was pensive for a moment.