His Brother's Bride

by Nancy M Bell

  “What shall I do with your uniform, Evan? I can wash it in the morning…”

  “Burn it. I never want to see the damned thing again.” He ground the words out between clenched teeth.

  “If you wish.” Annie bundled the wet filthy items into a ball and deposited them in a corner of the back mud room. Father could decide if burning them was the right thing to do. It was more of a decision than Annie wished to make at the moment.

  “Evan, dear. Are you quite alright? You gave me quite a turn showing up unannounced like that.” Mother hovered in the doorway. “The company has left,” she spoke to her husband as he returned with the medical bag. “Under the circumstances it seemed the best thing to do.”

  Father nodded and set the bag on the table, opening it to display the rows of tiny bottles and other equipment. Mother moved further into the kitchen and placed a tentative hand on Evan’s shoulder.

  “It’s nice to have you home for Christmas, son. However did you manage to get leave?” A smile trembled on her lips.

  “Not leave, Mother. I’ve got a blighty.”

  “A what?” Mother’s eyes widened and then she blinked twice.

  “A blighty, Mother. I’m invalided out.” A harsh laugh escaped him. “Got it hopping over the bags, left a piece of me for the Huns to chew on.”

  “Evan, speak English please. Hopping over bags, my stars. And what piece…Oh my!”

  Evan flipped back the blanket with is good hand to reveal the angry stump of his right arm. “Hopping over the bags means going over the top, scrambling out of the dubious safety of the trench into enemy fire. And…well, you can see what piece of me I left behind.”

  “Oh dear.” Mother sat down heavily in a kitchen chair as if her legs wouldn’t hold her. “Oh, dear.”

  “Mother, if you’re feeling faint why don’t you have Ivan bring you a cup of strong tea and your smelling salts.” Annie spared her a glance before tucking the blanket back around him.

  “I believe I will have some tea. Harold, what is that dreadful odour?” Mother waved a hand delicately in front of her nose. “I really am glad you’re home, Evan.”

  “I have trench foot,” Evan muttered. “I can’t hardly stand the stink of myself.” His face twisted with self-loathing.

  “We’ll deal with it. Now, let me see that arm, if you would.”

  Evan leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Annie watched closely as Father palpated the swollen flesh and pressed on the half-healed scars of his arm. Evan’s breath hissed through his teeth though he never moved.

  Mother’s skirts rustled as she departed in a rush, Ivan back from his bed warmer mission followed with her tea.

  “It’ll do. For now.” Harold Baldwin declared of the wound and smeared some bear grease mixed with some sort of pungent herbs. He took some of the mouldy bread he kept in the larder and wrapped the stump in clean lint bandages. “Now, the feet.”

  Annie bit her lip at the sight of the white swollen lumps below Evan’s ankles. How in the name of God did he manage to walk on those? Some of the skin was going dark which she knew wasn’t a good sign at all. Father dried them carefully and prodded gently at the darkened skin.

  “Not as bad as it could be, son. They’ll need some debridement, but we can certainly save them for you. Now let’s get you into bed, shall we?”

  “I could sleep in this chair,” Evan’s words slurred. “It’s been forever since I actually slept. Not safe…”

  Father nodded to Annie. She moved to Evan’s side and together they got him to his feet. Ivan showed up and helped steady the invalid as they made their slow painful way down the hall to the study. Annie stood back while Father and Ivan got Evan settled and covered warmly. The fire was burning well, Ivan moved to bank it a bit so it would last through the night. Father fed a few nuggets of precious coal into the heart of the flames.

  “I’ll just go clean up the kitchen and tidy the front hall,” Annie excused herself from the room.

  An hour later she peeked in the study door. Evan lay still as the dead under the mound of blankets. At first she thought him asleep but when the fire flared in response to the wind whipping down the chimney she caught the glint of his eye. Ivan lay curled in the big Morris chair head cushioned on his arm, fast asleep. Deciding not to disturb her brothers, Annie withdrew and went up the stairs. She’d heard Father’s tread on the stairs earlier and was surprised to detect the murmur of voices from behind her parent’s closed door. Whatever are they talking about? Evan, I suspect and how to deal with his new reality. She hesitated — it was wrong to eavesdrop, but…it would be advantageous to know what Mother thought of the situation in order to decide how to buffer Evan from her if need be. Her darling boy was no longer perfect and Annie was uncertain how her maternal parent would react to that once it really set in. You’d think she’d be over the moon that one of her boys has come home. Annie shook her head. The voices faded and the thin sliver of lamplight under the door darkened.

  She continued to her room, glancing at the extra bed. Thank goodness Rotha would be arriving in the morning and could take some of the burden of caring for Evan and dealing with Mother. She sighed. Now Hetty, that was another kettle of fish altogether. Father will probably ride into the village first light to take her the news so she wouldn’t be blindsided when she arrived for Christmas Day. It was anyone’s guess how her oldest sister might respond. Oh, she’d be overjoyed at the news Evan was home, but Hetty had the same opinion as her mother regarding less than perfect things, material or human.

  After stirring up the fire and then smooring it to keep til morning, Annie dropped into bed. She swore she’d only just closed her eyes when the most Godawful caterwauling had her bolting upright, quilt clutched to her throat.

  Evan! It must be Evan. No, that’s Ivan screaming. What in the world…?

  She was up and bundling into a warm robe in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. Wrenching open her door she fled down the stairs toward the study. Annie burst into the dimly lit room to find Ivan peering out from behind the wing chair where he crouched, hair on end and his eyes wide with terror. She waved at him to stay where he was and turned her attention to Evan.

  Her brother’s eyes were bulging in his thin face, mouth twisted in a rictus as he screamed in that high thin wail that sent shivers coursing over her skin. One hand clawed at the air as if he were trying to grasp something while the stump on the other side flailed to be free of the confining quilts. Dear Lord in Heaven. Is this what Della’s sister was talking about?

  “Evan! Evan, it’s me, Annie.” She stepped closer. “Evan.” The muscles under the hand she laid on his bad arm were hard as ice in the dead of winter and he didn’t seem to see or hear her. “Hush, now. It’s me. You’re safe, Evan. You’re safe.” As she spoke she ran a hand over his hair. “Hush now. Hush.”

  Her ministrations did nothing to lessen the screaming. His face took on a blueish tinge while the breathing became more erratic. The chords in his neck stood out in sharp relief as he struggled to breathe. Where is Father? “Ivan, go fetch Father. Now!” She spared him a glance.

  “No need. I’m here now. Annabelle, step aside please. Let me handle this.”

  Annie was relieved to give up her place at her brother’s side. She stood back twisting her fingers in the ties of her robe. Ivan flung both arms around her waist and pressed against her. His trembling shaking her as well.

  “Evan, wake up now. That’s a good lad,” Father shook Evan’s shoulders.

  Annie tightened her arm around Ivan’s shoulders. Father might as well be talking to himself. Dear God, poor Evan. Father glanced over at them, his gaze resting on Ivan the longest.

  “Ivan, why don’t you go up and sit with your mother, if you would. She’s quite undone by all this and I’d rather not leave her alone.”

  “It’s alright, you go ahead. Evan will be fine, he’s just having a nightmare. Father will calm him down. Go on, Mother will have need of you.”

  Ivan nodded and
after one last desperate look at the figure on the sofa fled the room.

  “Go fetch a basin of cold water and some clothes.” Father strained to keep Evan from falling off the sofa with his writhing.

  She returned in a few minutes, water sloshing over the rim of the bowl she carried. Kneeling by her father, she set the water on the floor and wet the thick squares of towelling. At Father’s nod she placed a folded cloth on Evan’s forehead and wiped his face with another. Father kept up a string of inconsequential platitudes delivered in a soothing tone. Outside wolves howled close to the house in response to the cries of distress emanating from within.

  Father squared his shoulders as if reaching some kind of inner decision. “Stand clear, Annabelle.”

  Startled, she did as she was told. Getting to her feet and moving a few paces away, gaze fixed on the two struggling features. The lamp guttered and almost went out, throwing the room into more shadow. She attended to the lamp and poked up the fire. The sharp crack of a slap sent her whirling about poker brandished before her. Horrified, she couldn’t make her feet move as Father slapped Evan again.

  “Father!” she managed to get the strangled word out. Horror turned to relief as sense came back into her brother’s eyes. His gaze landed on her and he surged up off the sofa carrying Father with him half-way across the room.

  “Bloody Boche! Bastard Germans! I’ll kill you with my bare hands, Fritz. Let me go!” He hissed at his father like a snake. “Let me go. Can’t you see what they’ve done? Look out there.” Evan gestured wildly at something only he could see. “Can’t you hear them screaming for help? For God’s sake let me go. I’ve got to get to him.” With a superhuman effort he wrenched free of Father and hurled himself at the sofa, clambering over the back of it, limbs windmilling in his agitation. “I’m coming Billy. I’m coming, hang on.” He slid over the back of the sofa, landing in a heap on the floor. “I’m coming, Billy. Keep yelling.”

  Father pulled the sofa further from the wall and jumped back when Evan swung at him with a vicious left-handed punch. “Fecking Boche. You can’t have him. Billy! No, no, oh no…” Evan’s fierce anger fled leaving him a boneless wreck sobbing inconsolably.

  “Stay with him, Annabelle. I need to fetch something.” Father whirled and was gone before she could reply.

  On tentative feet she approached Evan who lay where he fell, wedged between the wall and the sofa. He was cold under her hand when she touched him. Sinking down Annie gathered him in her arms and rocked him as she used to rock Ivan when he was young.

  “There now, there now. It’ll all come right. Just you wait and see if I’m not right. You’re safe, you’re home now. Everything will be right as rain come the morning,” she lied without a qualm. Who was Billy and what in God’s name happened over there? Going by Evan’s reactions, Annie was fairly sure she knew Billy’s fate. He must have been a mate of Evan’s. How horrible to not be able to go to the aid of a friend. She stroked her brother’s face, his harsh sobs reduced to silent tears now. Thank God! Father entered carrying another lamp and a shiny hypodermic needle in hand. She wriggled around to give him access to Evan’s good arm, disengaging it from where it clutched her.

  It was only work of a few seconds for him to find the vein and slide the needle home. Evan became a heavier weight on her and his breathing evened out and slowed. Father offered her a hand up which she gratefully accepted. Leaning down she pulled the quilts and blankets free of him.

  “We need to get him off the floor,” Father said. He moved the piece of furniture further away from the sprawled body. Grasping Evan under the arms, he flipped him over and dragged him away from the wall a good distance. “I’ll need your help to get him on the sofa, girl.”

  Annie nodded and took hold of her brother’s good arm. Between them they oxtercogged him upright and onto the sofa. Releasing a sigh of relief, Annie retrieved the pillow and tucked it behind his head. Father gathered the quilts and helped her tuck them around him. They stood side by side looking down at the injured man.

  “Someone has to stay with him,” Father remarked without looking at her.

  “It can’t be Ivan. The poor boy has already had more than he can be expected to handle.” Annie straightened her shoulders and rubbed at a sore spot on her hip. “I’ll sit with him until morning. Then someone else will have to take over.”

  “Rotha will be here on the morning train.” A frown crossed Harold Baldwin’s brow. “Someone will have to take the sleigh into the village to meet her.”

  “Let Ivan do it. It’ll take his mind off things and you know how he dotes on Rotha and loves to drive the sleigh,” Annie suggested.

  Father nodded at her and she found herself under the scrutiny of his assessing gaze. “You did well tonight, Annabelle. I thank you for your assistance.”

  “Harold?” Mother’s voice echoed down the staircase and through the open study door.

  He cast his eyes upward and moved toward the door. “I best go explain what happened to your mother.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  It was the first of many nights Annie was to sit with her brother and help him through the night terrors. Shell Shock, Della confirmed when Annie met her in the village to collect the mail one bright sunny January morning. Her sister was home from France for some secret reason Della wouldn’t, or couldn’t, share. It seemed a good idea for Frances to come and sit with Evan for part of the day. Annie observed them curiously. It was like they belonged to some secret club that anyone who hadn’t been overseas could be part of. In a way she envied them that comfort.

  Would it be like that when George came home? A part of him he couldn’t share with her, a distance she would be at sixes and sevens over how to bridge. The thought disturbed Annie more than she cared to admit. Just let him come home. Soon. And Peter, and Steve. Why haven’t we heard anything about Steve? Surely if he were dead they’d have figured that out by now.

  * * *

  Annie straightened and propped a forearm on the top of the handle of the hoe. The June sun burned bright in the brilliant blue of the sky that contrasted so sharply with the dark spruce and pine surrounding small patch of cleared fields. She wiped the trickle of sweat from her cheek with the corner of her apron and bent back to the task of ridding the beans from weeds.

  The back breaking but mindless work provided time to sort through her thoughts. She bent to pry a rock out of the turned earth and pitched into the basket two rows over already half full of stones.

  There were visitors last night, and not the usual kind. Annie sighed. There was always a steady stream of people coming up the long lane from the lake. Finlanders from Dean’s cottages on Doe Lake; logging was hard and dangerous work, natives occasionally, and other preachers, all coming to confer with Father. She disliked the preachers the most, they always set Father off on a tirade of fire and brimstone and eternal damnation.

  She snorted and dug the blade of hoe into the earth with more force than was necessary. With the sun beating down on her back, the biting flies rising from the turned soil and the humidity sticking the clothes to her body Annie figured she was already in Hell. She stopped short at the blasphemy of that thought and glanced around, guilt swirling in her gut. Surely Father couldn’t read her mind? Although, there was no telling with him, he seemed to know more than was humanly possible about what went on around the homestead and in the small village of Sprucedale that lay nearby.

  Her gaze rested on Evan carefully sowing rows of carrots and beets in the already turned part of the garden. Once the benighted stones were out of this part of the garden there were hills of potatoes and squash to plant. Bushel baskets of seed onions and coarse burlap bags of seed potatoes waited in the shade of the large maple by the gate. Bending back to her task, she chopped at the sandy soil and turned up yet another batch of rocks.

  “Annie!” She straightened at the sound of her name and squinted against the glare of the sun.

  “Della! How nice!” She swiped the back of her hand ac
ross her hot face and gathered her dusty skirts in one hand stepping over the turned earth.

  Evan joined her, pushing the sling holding the seeds around to his back. Annie hid a smile at the realization Frances was with Della. She snuck a look at Evan out of the corner of her eye, relieved to see Frances’ happiness reflected in his expression. He reached out his left arm to help Annie step over the low fence supporting the trellis for the red runner beans. For once his shirt sleeves were rolled up, even the one he usually wore pinned closed over the stump. His skin was a healthy brown from the hours spent in the sun and there was a tattoo on his forearm she’d never noticed before.

  “What brings you here?” Annie plunked down in the grass under a maple.

  “Father has some business with Mister Baldwin, so we thought we’d hitch a ride,” Della replied settling beside her. “My stars, it’s a scorcher today. Listen to the heat bugs sing.”

  “Come join us, Frances. Would you like a cup of water?” Evan held out the tin cup he lifted dripping from the oak bucket.

  “What’s that on your arm?” Frances sounded faint, her face pale in the dappled shade.

  “My arm?” Evan looked down stupidly. “What’s wrong with my arm?”

  Annie thought it was an improvement her brother didn’t assume the woman was asking about his missing limb. Evan dropped the cup into the bucket and reached out to steady Frances who backed up a step out of range. “What’s the mark on your forearm?”

  “Oh, that.” A smile crossed his face. “Steve and I got them in London before we shipped out. A lot of the lads got them, some shop near Waterloo, man by the name of George Burchett. Why?”

  “Did you and your brother get the exact same image?”

  Della scrambled to her feet to support her sister. “What is it, Frances? What’s wrong?”

  Frances ignored her and kept her gaze fixed on Evan.

  “Yeah, we did. A maple leaf and the words For King and Country. Brothers forever and our initials.”