Mountain Laurel

by Lori Benton

  Lily passed her simples box to Seona and took the baby from Katy. “Mister Allen, take Ruthie into the other cabin. I’ll need Katy with me.”

  Mister Allen halted Lily with a hand to her arm, too shocked to look at the infant. “If the babe’s come, what’s ailing Becky?”

  “Likely it’s twins.” Lily’s smile was less reassuring than it might have been had Rebecca Allen not cried out just then. A weak, desperate sound. Ruthie gave a hiccuping sob. Mister Allen scooped her up and carried her off.

  Inside the cabin where Missus Allen labored, a fire blazed in the chimney hearth. The warm air reeked of birthing, woodsmoke, and sweat.

  “Two babies,” came a strained voice from the dimness, confirming Lily’s guess. “First nigh killed me. Second’s like to . . . finish the job.”

  Half the cabin was taken up with bedsteads. In the middle of one Missus Allen lay, clad in a sopping shift, fists pressed to her belly. The oilcloth spread beneath her to protect the corn-husk tick was blood-covered.

  Seona set Lily’s box on a table, while Lily laid the infant on the other bed and unwrapped its swaddling. “Where’s the caul?”

  Katy pointed at the baby. “That’s all that come out.”

  Lily took the girl by the shoulder and turned her toward the door. “Ye did fine, Katy. Go now, fetch us some more water. Seona, come wash this baby so I can see to Missus Allen. When ye finish, set more water to boil on the crane.”

  Seona tried to put away memories of the birch hollow while she did as Lily bid her—noting in passing that this newest Allen was, in fact, a boy. She tried not to stare at Missus Allen with her big belly and her face screwed up in pain, while Lily told Seona what the trouble was. The afterbirth hadn’t come, which could be causing the bleeding.

  “Or could mean the twins shared it,” she allowed. “If the second comes fast, it’ll be all right. I think.”

  But it didn’t. Missus Allen’s pains came and went. She lay in a fretful doze between, bleeding out slowly onto the tick, while they used every scrap of cloth they could find to mop the flow. At last, sometime after nightfall, there came a gush as a second water broke. They got Missus Allen off the bed and onto an old birthing chair one of the children had fetched from the barn, and for a time they thought the second twin would come. But still it didn’t.

  “Turned catawampus,” Lily said after another check. “Feet first.”

  Seona did what she could to hold Missus Allen upright, feeling the woman strain until her face purpled and the cords stood out in her neck. She subsided with a whimper, the color draining from her face, leaving her white and heavy in Seona’s arms.

  “Mama?” she said over Missus Allen’s shoulder and realized she was weeping.

  Crouched on the floor between Missus Allen’s knees, Lily said, “Feet are coming. Push, Rebecca. Push.”

  But they couldn’t rouse Missus Allen again to push.

  Finally Lily looked at her. “Seona, help me get her to the bed. Then go fetch Zeb.”

  Clouds had come up thick, blocking the stars. Seona stood in the cabin doorway, staring at the face of the firstborn twin framed in his wrappings, features scrunched like a fist. Waking to hunger, she reckoned, but there was no chance of feeding yet. Her breath misted in the chink of light from the near-shut door behind her. It was too cold to be standing there with a newborn, but the night air at least was clean. No smell of blood. Even so it held a scent beyond the tang of woodsmoke pouring from the chimneys. Cold, familiar, but she couldn’t name it.

  Mister Allen had come at her fetching, talked with Lily, wept over his wife, then gone with his sons to bring in the cattle for the night. He hadn’t come back. Seona felt pity for his helplessness. They were all helpless. Lily had tried to pull the second baby from Missus Allen. It wouldn’t budge.

  “I’ve seen it once with a breech. Head’s gotten hung up inside. She’s lost so much blood I just don’t think . . .” Lily put a hand to her mouth, pressed hard, then said, “Anything else I was to try would only worsen her suffering and Mister Allen says don’t. She’s in God’s hands now. His will be done.”

  Grief clenched Seona as she glimpsed Katy Allen through the half-open door across the dogtrot, lying awake on a pallet with Ruthie nestled close.

  Snow. That’s what she was smelling. The first flakes drifted through the faint light from the cabin. Snow, when that morning she and Ian had lain beneath the birches with the sun shining golden through the leaves.

  She went back into the cabin with the baby in her arms, praying for his poor mama’s release. Mixed in was a terrified plea that she hadn’t already sealed herself to the same fate. She put a hand to her belly, blameless-flat from hip to hip. It wouldn’t stay so long, not with many more days like today. Then what they’d done in secret would be made plain, like with Ian’s parents.

  And then . . . what was it he’d called it? They’d have themselves a kebby-lebby.

  Snow in October. It was more in keeping with Massachusetts weather than what he’d expected of Carolina. Two nights had passed since its falling and it had yet to melt. Ian warmed his hands at the brazier he’d set up, then made another circuit of the shop, stooping for bits of wood to feed the flames. Time might as well have stopped when he returned to the news of Rebecca Allen’s childbed and Seona’s attendance. Apparently it meant to continue in abeyance until he had her back. In his arms, if he could manage it.

  At his workbench he picked up a chisel, its blade in need of honing. He put it down and fingered a length of pine board marked for dovetailing. His head jerked up as the door swung open, letting in the cold. And Rosalyn, expression as guarded as his own must be.

  “Do you mind my company, Cousin?”

  He did. But saying so would only further strain relations with the girl, with whom he had to go on living, like it or not.

  Rosalyn made up her own mind, shutting the door to stand inside the shop. “It’s some time since I was in here.”

  He knew exactly how long it had been—the day she discovered Seona’s secret.

  “What d’ye want, Rosalyn?”

  She rounded the workbench, hair pinned high, artful curls trailing down her neck. “I never apologized for my behavior at the springs. I don’t expect you’ll ever . . . But never mind. Will you at least forgive me, Cousin?”

  Forgive her. For drugging him and attempting to seduce him into marriage? For endangering his uncle? His every fiber rebelled at the notion but the last thing he needed now was further family strife. He could give her the words, however empty. “I will.”

  Rosalyn waited, expectant. “Have you something to say to me?”

  He ought to have known she wouldn’t shoulder the blame for that ugly scene alone. What could he say that wouldn’t sound an utter falsehood?

  “I regret . . . my treating ye roughly.”

  Rosalyn gave him a smile that once would have dazzled him senseless. Now it only made him wary. Had his aunt compelled her to this, or was it her own notion?

  Seeming satisfied, she left without his asking. Let them play their games. None of it mattered now. He had his uncle’s promise. All he needed was his da’s support. He’d written before they left the inn and posted the letter; it would be weeks before he heard from Boston. But he had Seona. Unless those hours at the birch hollow had been an enchanting dream.

  Could it take this long to catch a bairn? He’d expected Lily would stay a night or two to make certain the new bairn thrived but assumed Seona would have returned once it was safely born.

  He stared through the window at the snow-laced forest beyond the garden pales. “For pity’s sake, lass, hurry!”

  The words were still on his lips when two figures, one leading his uncle’s horse, emerged from the trees at the head of the footpath that led to the Reynolds’.

  He was out of the shop in an instant. Seona was wrapped in the arisaid, her face within its folds drawn with fatigue and strain. He halted, leaving a careful pace between them.

  �
�What’s happened?”

  “Missus Allen died,” she said in a voice small and cold. “I’m to ask will you set to making a coffin and get it over the ridge to Mister Allen by morning? Mister John’s gonna do the burying. We came home the long way, past their place.”

  He thought his chest would burst with the inrush of feeling—a frozen stab of grief for Zeb Allen at odds with the blood-warm joy of Seona standing before him again. Until she started walking away. Lily had led the horse toward the stable with no more than a glance at them, her face haunted with grief.

  He reached Seona in two quick strides. “Wait. Seona . . . come into the shop.” He dropped his voice until it was hardly audible above the crunch of snow beneath their feet. “We can have a moment.”

  “I can’t.” She slipped in the snow and he steadied her, but she pulled free. “I’m sure the washing’s done piled up.”

  “Hang the washing.”

  “I mean to.” She quickened her pace.

  Ian halted. Seona kept going and didn’t look back.

  There was pine board enough for a coffin. While Ian worked, he tried to reason away his dismay. What had he expected? That Seona would fling herself into his arms the moment she saw him, devil take all watching eyes? But what if more was amiss with her than sorrow or caution? Did she regret what they’d done?

  The hammer missed its mark. His thumb exploded in pain. Pressing it, throbbing, to his lips, he strode from the shop.

  The washhouse door was unlatched. Closing it softly behind him, he was enveloped in warmth and the harsh smell of lye. Seona had her back to him, prodding the kettle’s steaming contents with a stick. She was dressed as she’d come to him in the birch hollow, the same skirt with its tiny hole. He was behind her, reaching for her, when she spoke.

  “Please . . .”

  “Seona?”

  She dropped the stick with a splash, crying out.

  He drew her away from the rising steam, turning her wrists, seeking evidence of scalding—and found it, a spattering of bright-pink marks on her skin. Then he registered her face. She’d been weeping.

  “Come here,” he said. He thought she would resist him, but when his arms went around her, she molded to him, pressing her face into his chest and sobbing as if her heart would break. He held her, torn with her grief, relieved to have her in his arms.

  “Were ye praying?” he asked and heard a muffled affirmation from the vicinity of his chest. “For the Allens?”

  “And for you.”

  “Me?” He pulled back, needing to see her face.

  She pressed a fist to her breast, as though to stifle a pain there. “Ian, will you heed the Lord?”

  “Will I—?” He was baffled by the question.

  She took hold of his arms, beseeching. “When Missus Allen died, Mama said we do what we can, then bow to the Lord’s will. Are you bowing? Do you know His voice when you hear it?”

  Something like panic knotted in his throat. “I believe in the Almighty, Seona. I thought ye understood—”

  “I believe in George Washington but I don’t know him.” She was hiding nothing from him now. The veils were stripped clean from her eyes, yet he couldn’t bear what was revealed. The naked pleading. The doubt.

  “What would ye have me say? I’ve done things, Seona. I doubt the Almighty’s terribly keen on knowing me these days.” He’d disappointed her. If only he knew what she needed from him. “I know your voice. Isn’t that enough?” He bent to kiss her with the fire he’d contained since they parted blazing up.

  She stiffened. “Not here. They’ll know.”

  He let her go, wishing the whole world would disappear so he might have the freedom to hold her, love her. “What happened at the Allens’?”

  “Mama couldn’t save Missus Allen.”

  “That I know. But the child?”

  “It was twins. One lived. One never got born.”

  His gut felt as though a fist had landed there. “Is that what this is about? Ye’re afraid the same will happen to ye?”

  The idea was enough to chill his blood.

  “No . . .” Her eyes pooled with tears. “Yes.”

  Thought of a child and the host of complications it would mean for the plan of freedom he’d yet to share with her filled him with dread. Ought he to tell her that plan now? He’d meant to wait for word from Boston. No sense in raising her hopes until he was certain. But meantime . . .

  “Seona, if it’s a bairn ye fear . . .” He forced the words out like a breath he couldn’t spare. “Then I won’t touch ye again that way. For now.”

  Her eyes flicked to him, startled. Relieved?

  He put his hands to her shoulders, his lips to her brow. “Is that what ye want of me?”

  Don’t say yes.

  “Yes,” she said and stepped from his embrace.

  23

  The cabin was dark. Soon Malcolm would lead them up the ridge to the clearing by the burying ground to pray. No lantern would be lit until they were among the trees. If the moon was bright, not even then. Lily had wrapped herself against the chill. “Get your shawl, girl-baby. We’re starting.”

  Seona sat on her cot, barefoot in her shift. It was too dark to see Lily’s face. “I ain’t going this time, Mama.”

  “Feeling poorly?” Lily’s hand found her forehead. “Ye’ve not been yourself these past days.”

  Seona pulled back from her touch. She was sick, just not in the way she let on. It was four days since they’d come back from the Allens’. Ian had kept his word and stayed away. She didn’t know how much longer she could stand it. “Headache, is all. Don’t feel up to going. Go on afore the others leave you back.”

  “Go up to the kitchen for some bark tea.”

  “I will.”

  Lily left her, unhappily. Seona waited. When she figured they’d all passed through the orchard and started up the ridge, she wrapped herself in the shawl Ian called an arisaid and stepped outside.

  Up at the house a candle burned at Ian’s window, a halo of yellow. Tempting as a will-o’-the-wisp. A glimpse was all she got before a voice spoke from the dark.

  “Evenin’, Seona.”

  “Will!”

  He came out from under an oak. She pulled her shawl tighter. Cold seeped up through the soles of her feet. “Why didn’t you go with the others?”

  “Ain’t messing with that Jesus twaddle now.” Will’s voice was colder than the air as he dropped into a mocking chant. “‘Ride on, King Jesus, no man can hinder me—’” He broke off with a scornful breath. “Seems men hindered Him aplenty—to His death. Same’s they hinder me.”

  “Jesus? He didn’t stay dead,” she said, forgetting for a moment that candle in the distance.

  “You think so? Then what you doing hanging back?”

  “My head’s paining me. I’m going to fetch something for it.”

  Will moved closer. Moonlight caught the sheen of his eyes as his hand curled hard round her wrist. He jerked his chin toward the lighted window of the house. “Uh-huh. Mind how you go, girl—and what I said about them white men.”

  With a small shove he released her, opening his hand like he was flicking off dirt. Then he turned his back.

  She stood beneath the breezeway, in the cane-shadows where a few late roses clung. Ian was at his desk, face golden in the candle-glow. At first he was writing something. Then he set aside the quill. She watched through the window as he bent his head, raked fingers through his hair. Her heart squeezed tight.

  Among the canes she found a rose, past its glory and fading. She broke its stem and it fell open in her hand, colorless in the night.

  Her head jerked up when Ian snuffed the candle, plunging the window into darkness. Fear rushed in, clawing at her, urging her back to the cabin. Just as she made up her mind to go, the back door opened. Ian stepped out. He started toward her, quiet in his stride, but she could feel the tension in him as he neared. She didn’t make a sound; still he halted, a shadow framed in the breezeway arch.<
br />
  “Who’s there?”

  The hope in those words washed over her. “Me,” she said.

  He had her in his arms so fast it took her breath. He groaned, then found her mouth with his and gave her his warmth. His hands crept below her shawl. “What are ye doing here in the cold—in naught but your shift?”

  He slipped off his coat and put it round her, warm from his body, smelling of buckskin. The half-breed coat. She reached her arms around him, the rose crushed between them, its scent mingling with their breath. “I wanted to see you.”

  “Seona . . . I cannot eat, sleep, or work for this wanting. I said we wouldn’t . . .” Ian bent to kiss her again; his lips against hers smiled. “But would ye?”

  An urge to tell him no rose, but she knew she wouldn’t say it. She’d chosen this night’s path when she’d stayed behind alone.

  The heat of him was like a fire. She pressed closer. “Where can we go?”

  He took her hand to lead her, but she stumbled, feet gone numb from cold. He scooped her into his arms along with their wrappings. Along with the rose. She clung to him, clutching it to her breasts, as he stepped from the breezeway. Turned. Turned again.

  He made for the house.

  She scarcely breathed while he shut the back door, hoisted her against his chest, and started up the stairs. She felt his heart drumming as he went careful, straining to make no sound. He set her down in the passage and they half fell into his room, a tangle of limbs and coat and shawl.

  Seona breathed in air that smelled of him and the candle he’d snuffed. He eased the door closed. They stood listening but heard no voices. No hurried footsteps.

  Moonlight slanted through the window, falling across the bed. Ian led her to it, then slipped round to the other side to draw the hangings. She put a knee on the feather tick. Across it he reached for her, but she whispered to him, “Wait.”

  Taking the rose between her hands, she scattered the petals over the sheets, then let him draw her down among their sweetness.