Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River]

by River of Tomorrow

  Mercy was only vaguely aware of all these things. It was as if she were off someplace looking down on things that were not quite real. Her eyes were on the face of the woman on the bed, and the woman’s eyes were on her. Her slight body made only a small hump beneath the patchwork quilt that covered her. The skin on her face was soft and white, with scarcely any wrinkles. Her snow-white hair lay in soft curls around her small-boned face. Her eyes were large and as blue as the sky.

  Hod went to the bed and knelt down beside it. “Maw,” he said low-voiced and gently. “Looky here who’s come home.”

  The woman’s gaze remained on Mercy’s face. “I know. It’s Hester.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. Tears filled her eyes, overflowed, and ran from the corners into the hair at her temple.

  Hod got to his feet, and Daniel urged Mercy forward. She dropped to her knees beside the bed and took her mother’s frail hand in both of hers. Blue eyes looked into blue eyes for a long moment.

  “Hello . . . Mamma.” Tears filled Mercy’s eyes and rolled down her cheeks. All the resentment she had felt toward the Baxters for disrupting her life faded into nothing in the instant she saw the look of joy come over her mother’s face.

  “I’ve been waitin’ fer ya to come home.”

  “I’d have come sooner if I’d known about you.”

  “Yore as purty as ya ever was. I’da knowed ya in a crowd.”

  “And you’re just like I hoped my real mother would be.”

  “That mole on yore eye got a mite bigger.”

  “I expect it has.”

  “And ya got the brown spot on yer hinder?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I pined fer ya, Hester.” The soft lips trembled but held firm.

  “I’ve had a good life. I’ve been with good people. I’ll tell you all about them.”

  “I never gave up on ya. I knowed someday you’d come.” Her mouth turned down like a child’s, as if she no longer had the strength to hold it straight. She closed her eyes and cried silently.

  “I’m here now, Mamma. Don’t cry.” Mercy held her mother’s hand to her cheek and fought her own tears. She was conscious that Daniel stood close behind her, and that Hod stood at the head of the bed, as if to protect his mother from the strangers.

  The storm of tears passed, and Mercy wiped her mother’s soft cheeks with a hankerchief she drew from her pocket.

  “I’m . . . a-thinkin’ ya got ya a good strong man, Hester.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Mercy tugged on Daniel’s pant leg, and he knelt down beside her. “This is Daniel.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Baxter.”

  “Yer big, like my William was. He was strong as a bull, gentle as a lamb, but meaner’n sin when riled. Air ya takin’ good care a Hester?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m doin’ my best.”

  “That’s all a body can ask,” she said tiredly. “I like the looks of ya.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “You got any younguns, Hester?”

  “No, Mamma.”

  “I take it he knows what to do to get ’em. Ain’t never seen no man what didn’t. He looks to have good sproutin’ seed in ’em. He’ll give ya younguns.”

  “That’s what I’ve been telling her, Mrs. Baxter,” Daniel said smoothly, and nudged Mercy’s knee with his.

  “His eyes ain’t too close together, neither. It’s the sign of a providin’ man.”

  Mercy turned to look at Daniel. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  He slipped his arm across her shoulders, gave her a smile and a brief hug. He picked his hat up off the floor and got to his feet. “I’ll tend to the horses if you’ll tell me where to put them,” he said to Hod.

  “Hod, where’s yer manners?” Mrs. Baxter said, as if speaking to a small child. “Show Daniel where to put the horses.”

  “I just now been asked, Maw.”

  “Don’t ya be givin’ no sass, Hod. Where’s Lenny? Tell ’em to go kill some chickens. Tell Martha to . . . slice up a ham and cook a cobbler. We got a . . . homecomin’ to plan.” She became breathless and had to stop talking.

  “You needn’t put on anything special for us,” Mercy said quickly, getting to her feet slowly because her legs were numb from kneeling so long.

  “Maw still rules this roost,” Hod said firmly. “If she says have special fixin’s, we have special fixin’s.”

  “Of course, I only meant . . .”

  Hod went out and Daniel followed.

  “Hester?” The weak voice came from the bed. “Pull up the rocker and set a spell.”

  “I don’t want to tire you.”

  “Sit,” she commanded, and Mercy sank down in the rocker. “I just ain’t believin’ yore here. There’s so much to tell ya, so much to hear.”

  “We can talk later if you want to rest for a while.”

  Her mother rolled her head back and forth on the pillow. “Soon I’ll be . . . restin’ for . . .” Her words trailed away and her lids drooped.

  Alarmed, Mercy jumped to her feet and bent over her. The skin on her face had taken on a bluish tinge.

  “She drops off like that.”

  Mercy looked up to see Hod’s wife standing in the doorway. She came to the end of the bed.

  “She’s asleep? Oh, thank goodness! It scared me.”

  “She ain’t got no strength a-tall.” Martha went to the side of the bed and gently lifted Mrs. Baxter’s hand and covered it with the quilt. “She be a-sinkin’ fast,” she said sadly.

  “What’s the matter with her?”

  “When her man was took, she jist give up. When she come down with a fever, she hardly had no flesh on her bones a-tall. It jist cooked up what was left, ’spite of all the doctorin’ we could do. Maw says she ain’t goin’ ta get up.” Martha put her hand to her chest. “I reckon her heart’s plumb wore out.” She tiptoed to the door.

  “Martha”—Mercy followed her out onto the porch—“I want to be a help to you.”

  The big, plain woman looked at Mercy, and her eyes settled on the lace collar of her dress.

  “Why, I don’t know nary a thing ya can do,” she said slowly. “I done sent Lenny out to kill the chickens, ’n’ Dora’s comin’ with a mess of greens.”

  “Dora?”

  “Wyatt’s woman. She’s havin’ another youngun ’n’ she ain’t up to snuff, but she’s willin’.”

  Daniel came to the porch with Mercy’s carpetbag. “Where do you want this?”

  Mercy looked at Martha. “I’d like to change out of my good dress.” It suddenly occurred to her that Martha thought she was dressed too fine to help.

  “Maw . . .” The small girl came around the side of the house with the baby astraddle her hip. “He’s messed! It’s a-runnin’ down.”

  “Hold him jist a minute more. We’ll take ’em down to the creek and wash him up,” Martha said patiently, and turned back to Mercy. “Ya can go up to the loft. It’s where the boys sleep, but they ain’t there. I thought ta bed ya ’n’ yer man in the eatin’ room. It’s the best bed.”

  “No,” Mercy said quickly, hoping the color that rose to her cheeks went unnoticed. “You needn’t do that. Daniel and I can spread our bedrolls outside.”

  Martha looked shocked. “Company sleep out? Maw’d be plumb ’shamed,” she said, and her mouth snapped shut like a clam.

  “But where do you sleep?”

  “I been stayin’ here nights. Hod takes the younguns on to our place.”

  “You don’t live here?”

  “We got a cabin out yonder a ways. Go on up to the loft if ya want to. Maw’ll think she dreamed ya if she wakes up ’n’ ya ain’t there.”

  “I’ll take the bag up for you,” Daniel said when Martha walked away with the little girl and the baby.

  “I can take it.”

  “You’d better look at the ladder first,” he said with raised brows.

  They went into the eating room. It was larger that the other room and had an even larger fireplace at the
end. A large assortment of cook pots, ladles, trivets, and scoops hung close to the fireplace. A long plank was fastened waist-high to the wall, and on it were wooden bowls and kitchen equipment. Beneath the work shelf were several baskets and some tall covered tins. The table with benches on each side sat in the middle of the room. Two three-legged stools, a cupboard build against the wall, and a platform bed in the corner made up the furnishings.

  At the far end of the room, in the corner opposite the bed, a ladder stretched up into a hole in the ceiling floor. Built about a foot from the wall, the ladder went straight up. When she saw it, Mercy understood why Daniel had offered to take the bag up for her.

  “Can you make it up there?” he murmured close to her ear.

  “I’ll have to.”

  “Let me go first. I’ll reach down and give you a hand.”

  Daniel went up easily, as Mercy knew he would. She climbed the first few rungs of the ladder, trying to keep from stepping on her skirt. She hung there until Daniel reached down and grasped her hand. After that it was easy, and soon she was hauled up into the nearly dark loft.

  “Heavens! I hope I don’t have to do that often.”

  Mercy looked around at the pallets scattered on the floor, the clothes, the personal belongings of the Baxter brothers. She wrinkled her nose at the odor of unwashed bedclothes and dirty feet. Daniel had turned to back down the ladder. Mercy put her hand on his arm.

  “Daniel, I’m so glad I came to see her.”

  “I thought you would be.”

  “Have you seen Lenny or Bernie?”

  “They’re keeping their distance. Hod seems to be more reasonable. Don’t worry about me. Enjoy your visit with your mother.”

  Mercy wanted desperately to ask him what they were going to do about the sleeping arrangements, but she couldn’t find the words. He had heard what Martha had said. Maybe by night he would think of something.

  “I don’t want to leave my bag up here. I’m afraid mice will get in it.”

  “Change your dress and hand it down to me. I’ll be waiting below.”

  As soon as Daniel’s head disappeared, Mercy quickly changed into her brown work dress, carefully folded the blue one and put it back in the bag. She didn’t want to stay in the loft any longer than she had to. When she was ready to leave, she leaned over the hole in the floor and looked down. Daniel was there looking up.

  Mercy dropped the bag and Daniel caught it. “Back down,” he said. “I’ll guide your feet.”

  It was far easier going down than it was going up. When her feet touched solid floor, Mercy turned and leaned for a delicious moment against the only familiar thing in this whole, new, strange world.

  “It ain’t so bad, is it?” Daniel murmured, and cuddled her against him.

  “No. But I’d not be able to bear it without you. It’s all so strange. Yet I came from this place. I was born here. She’s my mother, and I’ve got a father buried somewhere nearby.”

  “It will all get straight in your mind. Just take things a little at a time.”

  They heard something drop and roll across the sagging, uneven floor, and Mercy moved reluctantly from Daniel’s arms.

  A woman stood beside the table staring at them. Her eyes flicked to the wooden bowl on the floor, then back. She was young and pregnant. Her dress was hitched up in front, leaving her bare legs exposed halfway to her knees. The corners of her wide mouth tilted, as if it were used to smiling. The skin was taut over her cheekbones. Dark, rough, springy hair was clubbed at the back of her neck. Her expressive eyes were as dark as soot but held a bright flame as they looked straight into Mercy’s. Then she smiled, and her face lit up like sunlight. It was the first smile Mercy had seen from any of the Baxters since she and Daniel had arrived.

  “Hello. I’m called Mercy. I was once called . . . Hester.”

  “I figgered ya was. Ya jist had to be Hester. I’m Dora. Wyatt’s my man. My, yore purty. Yer jist the purtiest thin’ I ever did see! Lordy! The horny men in these hill’ll go plumb loony when they set their sights on ya.”

  “Well . . . thank you.” I guess, Mercy added to herself.

  “This yore man?” Dora asked, then answered herself before Mercy could speak. “’Course he is. Wouldn’ta come if he warn’t. I just can’t get over how purty ya are, ’n’ how fine yore dress is. Ya got on store-bought shoes! Now ain’t that something? Bernie said ya was sightly, but Bernie’s as muddleheaded as a horny goose most a the time. Ever’body ’round here knows that ’n’ pays him no mind.”

  If Dora thought this dress fine, Mercy wondered what she would think of the blue one. At least she’ll talk, she thought, and cast her twinkling eyes in Daniel’s direction. He was smiling too.

  “I’ll get on outside.” Daniel’s hand lingered on her arm.

  Dora’s eyes followed Daniel out the door. “Lordy, Hester. Ya got yourself a real eye-buster. He’s about the most man I’ve clapped my eyes on fer a spell. Ha! Wyatt thinks he’s the best-lookin’ thin’ in these parts. He’ll be mad enough to kick a stump when he sees yore man.”

  “Daniel is handsome and . . . kind, and very dear to me.”

  “Love ’em, do ya?”

  Mercy looked into the girl’s open, smiling face, and decided she liked her very much. “Yes,” she said simply.

  “Now, ain’t that nice? Maw loved Paw Baxter somethin’ fierce. It tore her up when he was took.” Dora looked over her shoulder when Martha came in with the baby on her hip. “I got the greens, Martha. I washed ’em down at the creek.”

  “Wyatt ’n’ the boys workin’ on the barrels?”

  “No. Hod put ’em ta pullin’ stumps. How’d Maw take ta seein’ Hester?”

  “Took it good. Go in ’n’ set with her, Hester. I’ll put this youngun down and clean them chickens Lenny killed.”

  The floorboards under Mercy’s feet suddenly shook, a dog growled menacingly, followed by more heavy thuds beneath the floor. Martha picked up a piece of firewood and thumped the floor. The growling stopped.

  “Hogs root under the house,” Dora explained. “Sometimes they get to fightin’ with the dogs ’n’ make a racket enough to wake the dead.”

  “Best way ta keep snakes outa the house, to my way of thinkin’,” Martha said.

  “Do you have a lot of . . . snakes?”

  “I ain’t seen many lately. Hogs keep ’em cleaned out.”

  “I’d better see if Maw’s woke up.” Dora went into the other room.

  Mercy followed Dora and stood at the end of the bed while the small, dark-haired woman went to the side and leaned over.

  “Ye’ve waked up,” she crooned as if to a baby. “Now, ain’t ya glad ya let me brush yore hair this mornin’? If I’da minded ya, ya woulda looked like a burr head ’n’ scared Hester silly.”

  Mercy watched Dora smile fondly at her mother-in-law and thought that she must be a special woman to command so much love from her sons and their wives.

  “Yer jist talkin’ to hear yore head rattle, gal.”

  “’Course. Didn’t Wyatt say he brung me home ’cause ya needed sunshine ’n’ foolishness?”

  The sky-blue eyes looked pointedly at Dora’s bulging belly, then to Mercy.

  “That ain’t why he brung her.”

  “There ya go, tellin’ tales on Wyatt,” Dora said, teasing. “Is there something ya want, Maw? If there ain’t, Hester’ll sit with ya ’n’ I’ll give Martha a hand after I go see about my youngun.”

  “Is your Sister here?”

  “Wyatt fetched her to stay a spell. Ya want the shutters pushed back so ya can see the trees?”

  Dora adjusted the shutters and left the room. Mercy drew the hickory rocker up close to the bed and sat down. Now that she was alone with her mother, she didn’t know what to say.

  “Ya feelin’ kinda at odds, Hester?”

  Mercy smiled. “How did you know?”

  “Ya got a pucker to yore brow like Will had.”

  “Tell me about him.”
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br />   “He fetched me here when I warn’t more’n fourteen. This here was the purtiest, wildest place ya ever saw. Turkeys come right up to the door, deer, elk, and possum aplenty. Big, Will was. Me ’n’ him . . . built this . . . place.” Her breath left her, and she had to rest.

  “The land is flat back in Illinois where I’ve been living,” Mercy said to fill the void.

  “It pert nigh kilt Will when he went to fetch ya home, ’n’ the folks was all dead ’n’ no sign of ya.” Mrs. Baxter rolled her head on the pillow and looked out the window. He was powerful cut up over it ’n’ grieved ’n’ grieved. It was a bad time.”

  Mercy leaned over and took her hand. “I was found in the cellar by a man named Farrway Quill. They had put me there to keep me safe. He said they were killed by river pirates for the oxen and the horses. He didn’t know what to do with me. He thought my folks had been killed, so he took me home with him.”

  “They was good to ya?”

  “Very good. They raised me as if I were their own.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.” Her lids drooped, and Mercy thought she had fallen asleep. Soon she opened her eyes and said, “I’ve got yore Paw’s death crown. I knowed he’d have one. He was a strong-willed man. It was in the pillow he died on. I want ya to have it.”

  Mercy looked puzzled. “What is it? You found something in his pillow?”

  “Ain’t ya never heard of a death crown?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Landsakes! Get in the bottom drawer in the chest ’n’ get out that wood box on this end.”

  Mercy found the small, square box and took it to the bed. It was made from thin sheets of wood smoothed to a satiny finish. A rose was carved on the top. A faded ribbon was wrapped around it and tied with a bow.

  Mrs. Baxter ran her fingers over the top of the box. “Hod made this here box. He done good. Open it up, Hester.”

  Mercy untied the ribbon and lifted up the lid. Inside was a group of feathers formed in a knot about the size and the shape of a clenched fist set on end. The white-and-gray feathers were swirled in the same direction, even on the top.