Midwife of the Blue Ridge (26 page)

through the holes, and after a day or two, the scalp mark scabbed

over with dark scales. When the scabs lifted, ol’ Pierre’s noggin

was covered from stem to stern with shiny pink skin.”

H

Ada rushed along behind Maggie and Alistair, bearing an arm-

load of linen, following them to the cookhearth. “I beg ye t’

think twice, Maggie . . .”

“Ada! Please! Enough of yer clishmaclaver—we’re doin’ this

thing.” Upon reaching the dining table, Maggie set her basket

onto the bench. Alistair set the kettle of water he carried on the

gridiron over hot coals.

“Pokin’ holes in a body’s head.” Ada snapped a sheet out over

the long table. “It’s not right. The Good Lord has provided us all

the holes we need—”

“And it’s time t’ shut the hole he provided you, wife,” Alistair

added.

Ada ignored her husband with practiced ease. “Maggie, you

young folk tend t’ rush ahead without ken to God’s boundaries. I

canna help but believe yer fi ddling with what is His will.”

Maggie fl uffed a pillow and laid it at the head of the table. “If

we do naught, Mary surely dies. This is her best chance. Her

onliest chance. A chance provided by God, maybe.”

Ada struck a stance with arms akimbo. “Still, the poor thing

has already suffered much.”

Maggie pulled an amber glass bottle from her basket. “A wee

182 Christine

Blevins

drop or two of henbane will keep her in deep sleep. Mary will

not feel a thing.” She measured a careful dose of the potent tinc-

ture into a tin cup and held the bottle up to the sunlight.

An’ there’s plenty left if things dinna go well . . .

H

Seth laid Mary Bledsoe carefully onto the sheeted tabletop. Her

blue eyes were wide open. “Susannah’s awake as well—” he told

Maggie. “Dinna fash, she’s in good company. Ada’s spoonin’ a

bit of broth intae her and Eileen is reading lovely poetry aloud.

Naomi and Winnie are keeping company as well.”

Disoriented, Mary looked up at Maggie and Seth hovering

over her and began to whimper, clutching fistfuls of linen, mewl-

ing like a newborn lamb. “Sha, dearie.” Seth stroked the bit of

Mary’s cheek not swathed in bandage with his grimy forefi nger.

“Maggie’s goin’ to give ye medicine to make ye feel better.”

Maggie passed her arm under Mary’s narrow shoulders, an-

gled the girl up, and held a tin cup to her mouth. “Drink up,

darlin’ . . .” she crooned. The little girl swallowed then sputtered,

pursed her lips, and turned away.

“I ken it’s vile.” Maggie pressed the cup to her mouth. “Finish

the lot and I’ve a nice sweetie for ye . . .” The bribe parted Mary’s

lips and Maggie was able to get the sedative down her throat.

“There’s a good, good lass.” She fished a lump of shop sugar

from her pocket and slipped it into the child’s mouth. A smile

passed over Mary’s face and her eyes fluttered shut. Maggie laid

her patient down, turning the girl to lie on her stomach, her in-

jured head positioned comfortable on the pillow.

Carry ing a thick leather roll like a stout stick in one hand,

Tom crossed the fortyard from the smithy with a skip in his

stride. “We’re in luck,” he announced upon reaching the make-

shift surgery. “Willie had one, the cordwainer had two in his kit,

and the cooper had one as well.” Tom unrolled the leather onto

the table, displaying four stubby pegging awls. He gripped one

knobby handle in his fist. Jutting from between his fi ngers like a

Midwife of the Blue Ridge
183

stinger, the two-inch triangular blade tapered to a fi ne, needle

point. Maggie pressed the pad of her index finger to the tip,

drawing a bright bead of blood.

“Careful,” Tom said. “I had Willie hone them extra sharp.”

Alistair called from the cookhearth, “Maggie! Water’s on the

boil . . .”

“Unwind her bandage for me, Tom, while I fi x a wash for the

wound.” She fished a muslin sack from her basket and tossed two

handfuls of dried marigold flowers into the rolling boil. The

blossoms swirled into an instant sunburst. Maggie used a pot-

hook to set the kettle to the side and ladled half the yellow infu-

sion into a tin bowl.

At tableside, she found a crowd gathered and offering unsolic-

ited commentary as Tom peeled back the last bloodstained linen

pad. Maggie set her bowl on the table and leaned in close to ex-

amine Mary’s scalped head. Crusty around its ragged edge, a

rude fi ve-inch circle of skin had been carved away—exposing a

crown of smooth skull stained rusty with blood.

“This wound has calmed considerable. Not near as angry as

last night.” Maggie sniffed, fearful she’d find infection’s moldy

goat cheese smell. Instead her nostrils met the tang of raw meat.

“Smells right. No corruption there.”

“She’s fast asleep,” Seth said. “Oughtn’t we be gettin’

started?”

“Bide a wee.” Maggie pinched off a handful of cotton lint and

dipped it into the marigold tea. “I want to clean the bone.”

Tom looked around. “I’ll need something sturdy to sit upon . . .”

“I’ll go fetch a stool,” Seth volunteered.

Maggie swabbed Mary’s wound. Tom and Alistair chatted

with the audience. John Springer settled on a nearby stump, tun-

ing his fi ddle.

Most of the settlers were on the trail heading back to their

homesteads, but some stragglers and the population who called

the station home—tradesmen and newcomers seeking a claim—

184 Christine

Blevins

formed a curious crowd jostling for position under the tarp.

Some even began to seat themselves at the benches fl anking the

table, as if ready to dish up their supper.

Jamie Raeburn and Willie the younger tussled over the seat

closest to the head of the table. Catching everyone by surprise,

they moved swiftly from angry words to shoves and then to

blows. The occupants of the benches scattered; Jamie and Willie

fell to the ground, rolling, grappling, grunting, and swearing.

Maggie skittered out of the way, catching her basket by the

handle before it hit the dirt. Her tin bowl toppled, splashing bril-

liant yellow over the combatants. Mary’s poor head bounced on

her pillow as the wrestlers smashed into the table trestles. Mag-

gie rushed back and held on to Mary to keep her from being

bumped from the tabletop.

Fiddle tuned, John Springer sawed the strings with a lively

reel; the boisterous crowd chimed in with a raucous chorus,

encouraging either Willie or Jamie to give the other “hell.”

Alistair insinuated an iron pothook between the squabblers to

pry them apart while Tom clapped Willie by the collar and

pulled him off.

Maggie let fly the soggy wad still in her hand, striking Willie

splat on the forehead. “BUGGER OFF! All of yiz!” She moved

around the table like a rabid sheepdog, shoving and poking ev-

eryone back to a comfortable distance, some three feet away.

“But I canna see a thing,” big Hamish complained from the

back row.

“Ye can see just fine,” Maggie insisted.

“Let up, Maggie . . .” Jacob Mulberry whined. “None of us

ain’t never seen a hole put to anyone’s head . . .”

“Stiek yer gobs,” she growled. “Yer bound t’ wake the lass.”

“I’m amazed she didn’t wake,” Tom said. “That is strong

medicine you dosed her with.”

“Aye, well, she needs strong medicine to get through what we

have planned for her.”

Midwife of the Blue Ridge
185

Chubby Charlie Pritchard said, “Why all the bother anyway?

Even if she survives havin’ her noggin bored through, the gal

still ends up living her life with a head lookin’ like a burst

melon—”

“Shet yer hole, ye great gallumpus!” Maggie came fl ying

around the table, wagging her finger an inch from Charlie’s nose.

“Have ye not an ounce o’ pity for poor Susannah? We’re trying t’

save her only child here. Look at ye—” She poked her fi nger into

his paunch. “More guts than brains and a face like th’ south end

of a northbound ox to boot, but I wager yer mother loves ye re-

gardless, na?”

Properly chastened by mention of his mother, Charlie sank

back to stand as a silent observer while his fellows howled and

hooted. Maggie marched to the hearth to collect the rest of the

marigold tea and came back brandishing the pothook. “Pipe

down—th’ lot of yiz! This is a serious business, aye? Yiz want t’

see a hole put to a head? Well, th’ next man who rankles me gets

a clout on the nob.”

Seth returned to find a passive and orderly audience. He set a

three-legged stool at the head of the table. “There ye go,

Tom . . . best get started.”

“Um- hmm . . . time t’ get started.” Tom tested the strength of

the stool. He rolled his sleeves. He paced around the table, glanc-

ing at the sun. He stopped to toy with the awls arranged on the

leather swath, and then he studied the little girl’s butchered skull.

“I don’t know, Maggie . . . it may be that thy hand is better

suited to this task.”

Maggie slapped an awl into his palm and gave him a shove.

“Like it or no, this task has fallen plump upon ye, Tom. Yiv seen

it done, now have at it.”

Resigned, he sat down, adjusted the stool, and gingerly turned

Mary’s head to face his left. “Well . . . I guess I’ll just aim for

center and then work my way ’round.”

Seth and Maggie crouched next to him, watching as he

186 Christine

Blevins

centered the awl tip in the field of bare bone. Cupping Mary’s

chin with his left hand and the knobby handle in his right, Tom

twisted the sharp steel into her skull. A thin corkscrew of bone

spiraled up from the site and he was surprised by the faint smell

of burned hair.

“Mind, dinna bore too deep . . .”

Tom stopped and let out a breath. “It feels like I’ve drilled

through.” He pulled the awl out with a counterclockwise twist.

A pink pearl of jelly oozed up from the hole, no bigger than a

mustard seed. Everyone closed in for a better look-see. Young

Willie standing in prime front-row position gagged, doubled

over, and retched on his neighbor’s boots. Tom scrunched a face

at the sour smell. Seth ran over to kick dirt over the sick, offering

the general announcement, “Anyone else wi’ a pukey stomach—try

and cast up yer accounts a ways from the table.”

“Tha’s a lovely hole, Tom.” Maggie clapped her hands.

Tom sat back, satisfi ed. “It went easier that I expected.”

“Like drilling a piece of maple?” Alistair asked.

“Probably more like oak,” Seth suggested.

Tom scratched his head. “Oak . . . no . . . I suppose it felt more

like ash—”

Maggie interrupted the inane comparison, rapping Tom and

Seth on their heads with her knuckles. “Imagine how long it

would take to drill through yer thick skulls. Mary’s wee head

bone is not fully hardened an’ that’s why the drillin’ goes easy.

Quit bletherin’ and finish the job whilst she sleeps.”

Tom continued to drill holes, developing a gridlike pattern,

each hole approximately one inch away from the next. He

stopped, set down the tool, and massaged his hand.

Seth took up a sharp awl. “Move over—I’ll spell ye.”

Alistair also offered to take a turn, as did Maggie. Two hours

later, between the four of them, they had bored thirty- seven tiny

holes into the sleeping girl’s head. Per Tom’s recollection of the

Midwife of the Blue Ridge
187

operation he had witnessed, Maggie simply dressed the wound

with a swaddling of fresh linen strips.

“We’ve done our best by ye, lass,” Maggie whispered as Seth

carried Mary back to the blockhouse. She gathered her things,

tucking the amber bottle of henbane into the deepest corner of her

basket.

14

Both Human and Divine

Tom glanced up at the sun melting a hole in the sky and dragged

the sack of barley to a rare piece of shade near the blockhouse.

Laying his kit to the side, he tossed his hat on the pile and sank

down to sit, too tired to bother with the knots on his leggings

and moccasins. Using the barley for a backrest, he stretched his

legs and wriggled back, molding the grain into a comfortable

support. Friday moseyed over with tongue lolling, turned around

three times, and flopped down in a snort, laying his muzzle to

rest on his master’s lap.

Tom pulled two books from his pouch, thanking his lucky

stars Eileen Wallen had been willing to part with them for ten

Spanish dollars.
Worth every penny
, Tom thought, the written

word and Friday often his sole companions in the wilderness.

He examined the larger of the two volumes purchased. Leather

bound in tooled black morocco with gilt titles, this book was

undoubtedly the finest he had ever owned. He opened to the fi rst

page, admiring the marbled endpapers. Running callused fi ngers

across the illustration on the engraved frontispiece, he read the

title:
The Life and Strange and Surprising Adventures of Robin-