The Surrogate

by Henry Wall Judith

  It was dark when she nursed him again, this time with seemingly better results. While he nursed, she tried to plan.

  She hoped that Kelly and Montgomery hadn’t discovered that she was missing until morning and assumed she was already hundreds of miles away. She doubted if anyone would be looking for her this close to the ranch. Maybe she should just stay here for another day or two and give the roads a chance to clear.

  Except she needed to find someone to stitch her up and either reassure her that the heavy flow of blood was normal or do something to stop it. And she needed baby clothes and diapers. Needed to buy a book on how to take care of a baby. Needed to find a place to stay. And a computer. A new name. And a cup of hot coffee would be really nice.

  What choice did she have but to press on? Just the thought of loading her things back into the car made her exhausted, but she really should leave while it was dark. If she waited until tomorrow evening, she would have to find more firewood, and she had already scavenged most of the wood around the house. To find more, she would have to go farther out and leave the baby here alone. Besides, eventually someone was going to notice the smoke coming from the chimney.

  Leaving the baby on the mattress, she ate a couple of granola bars and drank a bottle of water. Then she bundled up the bloodied towels and bedding and stuffed them into the trunk. After carrying her other possessions out to the car, she tidied up the house as best she could, collecting the trash in bags and putting them in the car to be discarded later.

  By the time she was finished, she was exhausted and the baby was crying.

  Once again she offered a breast to him. This time he grabbed hold like a little piglet. And Jamie laughed out loud.

  “We learn fast,” she told him. How beautiful he was, she thought as she looked down at him. How perfectly beautiful. Her baby. She was a mother now. Not a surrogate mother. An honest-to-gosh mother. She would die before she let anyone take him away from her.

  When he seemed to have finished nursing, she put the baby in a nest she had made for him among the items piled on the backseat. Ralph jumped into the front seat.

  She got in the car and took a last look at the house, thinking of the long-dead family that had once lived here. Their house had saved her life and that of her baby.

  She drove with her headlights on low beam, crawling along at a snail’s pace, almost sliding off the road several times. Once, she saw headlights up ahead and panicked, but the vehicle turned and headed toward a cluster of lights a half mile or so off the road.

  At dawn she met a pickup truck. She could tell that the driver was an elderly person with frail, hunched shoulders.

  The sun had cleared the horizon when she met a second pickup, this one driven by a man wearing a cowboy hat. He raised a finger from the steering wheel by way of a greeting. Jamie nodded then watched in the rearview mirror, half expecting him to turn around and chase after her.

  She drove a bit faster now that it was daylight. The roadbed was covered with loose snow but not icy. After an hour or so, she reached the intersection with U.S. 54. Just a few more miles and she would be leaving Marshall County. Forever.

  The lone service station in the tiny town of Monroe was closed, but it took less than an hour to reach Stratford, where she stopped at a convenience store. She filled the gas tank and purchased diapers, baby wipes, Kotex, and a cup of coffee and a doughnut. Back in the car, she diapered the baby and wrapped him in the last clean towel. Then she drove around to the back of the store and deposited her trash bags in a Dumpster.

  From Stratford, she drove northeast on Highway 54. In less than an hour, she crossed the state line into Oklahoma. Will Rogers offered a smile and a wave from a billboard, welcoming her to the Sooner State. She took a deep breath and gave a prayer of thanks.

  Just minutes later, she was driving into the town of Goodwell, population 1,192, according to a sign posted at the city limits. She pulled abreast of some children waiting for a school bus and asked for directions to the local cemetery.

  It looked as though considerably more people had been buried in Goodwell’s cemetery than now lived in the town. She drove up and down the lanes, hoping she could spot a suitable grave marker from the car. She could not. So she tucked the baby inside her jacket and, with Ralph following along behind, walked up and down the rows until at last she found what she was looking for.

  Janet Marie Wisdom had been born the year after Jamie’s birth and died at age three. Jamie took note of the girl’s birthday then touched the tombstone, thinking of the grieving parents who had buried this child here. “I hope you don’t mind if I borrow your name, little Janet,” she said. “I’d rather your family name was Smith or Jones, but Wisdom is a fine name.”

  Then it was on to Guymon. The town was considerably larger than Goodwell, with a downtown clustered around a courthouse square. She stopped at a service station and looked in a phonebook for midwives. Only one was listed. Mae Vandegrift, certified nurse-midwife. She dialed Mae’s number and explained that she had had a baby unattended yesterday morning and was bleeding pretty badly.

  “What’s your name, dear?”

  Jamie hesitated. “Janet,” she said. “I can’t go to the hospital. I don’t have any insurance. I can pay some, but not much.”

  “You on the run?”

  “Yes,” she said. “From my boyfriend.”

  Mae explained how to find her house.

  It was a one-story brick dwelling set well back from the road. A pair of horses watched over the fence as Jamie turned into the driveway.

  A middle-aged woman with graying hair answered the door. “You and that baby get yourselves in here out of the cold,” she ordered.

  Jamie stepped into a cozy living room warmed by a gas heater installed inside a flagstone fireplace. Family pictures smiled from the mantel. A large and well-worn Bible sat in the middle of the round coffee table.

  “The boyfriend do that to you?” Mae asked, pointing at the lump on Jamie’s forehead.

  Jamie nodded.

  Mae sighed and shook her head as she reached for the baby. “And no one was with you when you had this baby?”

  Again Jamie nodded.

  “You poor child. Where are your folks, honey?”

  “Dead,” Jamie said, blinking back tears. The kindness and concern in the woman’s voice threatened to erode the force of will that had kept her going until now. She squared her shoulders. She was strong, she reminded herself. She would always be strong. She had to be for her baby’s sake.

  “So, what are you going to do?” the midwife asked, indicating that Jamie was to sit on the sofa.

  Jamie sat down, putting the baby to her shoulder and laying her cheek against his head. “I don’t know yet,” she admitted.

  “I can give you information about state assistance programs for single mothers,” Mae said as she reached for the baby and placed him lengthwise on her lap. The baby’s eyes were open, and he seemed to be looking up at the midwife. “Well, aren’t you a handsome little fellow. I bet your old aunt Mae can find some clothes to dress you in.”

  Jamie reached over and stroked her baby’s cheek. “I’ve never been around babies much. I need to buy a book and learn how to care for him.”

  “I’ll give you some reading material, and your own instincts will kick in. He seems calm enough. Have you tried to nurse him?”

  Jamie nodded. “But the stuff coming out of my breasts doesn’t look much like milk. Maybe I should buy some formula.”

  “No call for that. He’s getting exactly what he needs.”

  Mae asked Jamie how she was feeling, then, carrying the baby, she led the way to her clinic, which was housed in a room that been built onto the back of the house. “My mother built this room for a beauty parlor,” Mae said as she struck a match and lit a gas heater. “I grew up shampooing hair and taking out curlers.”

  After washing her hands, the midwife thoroughly examined the baby, then listened to his heart and lungs, took his temperature,
cleaned the cord stump, and weighed him. At five pounds nine ounces, he was a bit undersized but seemed quite healthy, Mae assured Jamie. She explained how to care for the cord stump and that the greenish stuff that was starting to come out of his bottom was normal.

  Once she was finished with her examination, Mae diapered the baby, dressed him in a pair of fleecy pajamas, wrapped him in a pink blanket, and placed him in an infant carrier. “Sorry about the pink blanket,” she said.

  Jamie had the feeling that she wasn’t the first woman who had showed up at Mae’s door with a baby wrapped in a bath towel.

  “Now it’s your turn, Janet,” Mae said, handing her a flowered gown and pointing to a curtained-off corner of the room.

  With Jamie sitting on the end of the examining table, Mae took her blood pressure, checked her pulse, listened to her heart and lungs, took her temperature, then helped her lie back on the table. With her head resting on a clean, soft pillow, Jamie realized how exhausted she was.

  Mae covered her with a sheet, guided her feet into the stirrups, and sat on a stool at the end of the table.

  “Good grief, girl!” she exclaimed. “You’re just one big bruise! That so-called ‘boyfriend’ should be arrested!”

  Jamie said nothing, feeling almost guilty that she was allowing some nonexistent man to be maligned.

  “Well, you tore some,” Mae said, “but not too bad for a first baby. I’ll clean you up and stitch you back together. You’ll be just fine.”

  When Mae finished her examination, she explained that she was deadening the perineum as best she could but that Jamie was still going to experience some pain.

  Jamie clenched her fists and tried not to cry out, which proved to be impossible. Still, it was nothing compared to what she had been through giving birth.

  The stitches in place, Mae helped Jamie into a sitting position and rattled off a list of instructions for her and the baby. “I’ve got all this in writing, so it’s okay if you don’t remember everything.”

  “What about a birth certificate?” Jamie asked.

  “We’ll get to that,” Mae said. “First, I want to watch you nurse this little guy.”

  Mae showed Jamie how to position the baby and discussed how long and how frequently she should nurse him. “It’s best to nurse him on both sides each session,” she instructed. “You may have to tickle his cheek or jiggle him a bit to keep him awake.”

  Once the baby had nursed on each breast and was sleeping contentedly, Mae put him back in the infant seat. Jamie got dressed and carried the baby into the kitchen. Mae gave her a cup of hot tea and a generous slice of homemade banana-nut bread, then sat across the table from her, holding an official-looking form.

  “Since you obviously just had a baby, I can sign this form as ‘certifier.’ If I had delivered the baby, I would be ‘attendee.’ But either way, it’s all legal and aboveboard.”

  “Do I have to list the father’s name on the birth certificate?” Jamie asked.

  Mae shook her head. “No. If you had a husband with you, I’d be required to report his name, but otherwise, I can just leave that line blank. Okay, now, what is your full name, dear?”

  “Janet Marie Wisdom.”

  Mae looked up. “There’re some Wisdoms over Goodwell way. You any relation to them?”

  “Actually, I was born in Goodwell.”

  “That so,” Mae said, studying Jamie’s face.

  Jamie’s heart skipped a beat. She should have driven on to the next county before looking for a midwife. Or found a less common family name to borrow. Goodwell was too close to Guymon. Mae probably knew most of the families in this county.

  “Okay,” Mae said, returning her attention to the form. “Mother’s birthplace—Texas County. Baby’s birthplace—Texas County.”

  When she asked Jamie her date of birth, Jamie told her the date on the long-dead three-year-old’s tombstone.

  Mae paused again, regarding Jamie over the top of her reading glasses for several heartbeats before returning her attention to the form. “So, what are you going to name the baby?” she asked.

  “William Charles Wisdom.”

  The midwife wrote down the name. “Okay, Janet, I’ll send this in the morning. You can get a copy of the official birth certificate from the state health department.”

  Jamie asked to use the bathroom before leaving. When she returned, Mae had carried the baby into the living room and was copying down something from the Bible on the coffee table.

  Loaded with booklets on infant care, useful addresses, foiled-wrapped slices of banana-nut bread, and a bottle of orange juice, Jamie asked the midwife how much she owed her. Mae shook her head. “I know what it’s like to be in an abusive relationship. You can pay me by taking good care of yourself and little William.”

  “Billy,” Jamie said. “I named him for my father, and everyone always called him Billy.”

  “Billy Wisdom. Now, that’s a right nice name.”

  “I can never thank you enough,” Jamie said, her eyes misting over.

  Mae opened her arms and Jamie stepped into them gladly. “I know, honey, it’s been rough,” Mae said soothingly, patting Jamie’s back. “But you have your health and a fine baby boy. And it would seem that you’ve taken the necessary precautions to keep the boyfriend from tracking you down.”

  Mae handed Jamie some tissues. She blew her nose then bent to lift the baby from the infant carrier.

  “No, you take that along with you,” Mae said. “I have a base for it that turns it into a car seat. I keep a lookout for used ones. And baby clothes. You’d be surprised how many mothers get caught unprepared.”

  “I’ll send you money someday,” Jamie said. “I promise I will.”

  “Never you mind,” Mae said. “You just take good care of yourself and little Billy.”

  Mae put on her coat and carried the base out to the car. “Oh, your poor little dog,” she said when she saw Ralph. “You should have brought him inside.”

  Ralph raced around the yard while Mae helped Jamie clear a place in the backseat and install the base for the infant seat. Once Billy Wisdom and his carrier were securely fastened in place, Jamie hugged Mae once again. “I’d all but forgotten that there were good people in the world,” she admitted.

  “Lots of good people,” Mae said. Then she reached inside the pocket of her coat and pulled out a folded piece of paper. “My maiden name was Wisdom. I’ve written down the names, birth dates, and birthplaces of Janet Marie Wisdom’s parents. You’re going to need this information to get a copy of her birth certificate and apply for a Social Security number in her name.”

  “I am…I am so sorry,” Jamie stammered. “I didn’t know what else to do. The baby’s father comes from a very rich family. I was afraid that…”

  Mae held up her hand. “No need to explain, and you can rest assured that if anyone comes around here looking for you, they’ll get a blank stare from me. The good Lord is looking out for you, honey. He took you to little Janet’s grave then turned right around and directed your path to her great-aunt’s house. She was a sweet child and much loved. Use her name well.”

  For a moment Jamie thought her knees were going to buckle. “I will,” she said. “I promise that I will.”

  Chapter Twenty-four

  GUS LOOKED OUT the window as the plane banked for a landing. The freshly cleared airstrip stood out starkly against the white landscape.

  His kingdom was laid out below him, with Hartmann land as far as the eye could see—a sea of snow-covered land. He remembered Grandpa Buck saying that a man could never have too much land. The more land a man owned the more important he was.

  He could see the little cemetery where his grandfather, father, and Sonny were buried. And Montgomery’s stillborn baby.

  He’d always known that Montgomery worshipped his grandfather, but somehow it had never occurred to Gus that they might have been lovers. Poor Montgomery. How sad she must have been when her baby didn’t live. Had his grandfat
her also been sad? Or just relieved?

  Kelly met the plane.

  “More bad news,” she announced as she pulled away from the airstrip. “Jamie Long had the baby.”

  Kelly drove him to what once had been the McGraf farm. Gus went in and looked around. At the blood-soaked mattress. The thick pile of ashes in the fireplace. Trash left by previous visitors. No fresh trash, though. Jamie had cleaned up after herself and taken it with her.

  He pointed at the mutilated second mattress. “What’s the story on that?”

  “Probably she used the stuffing for kindling.”

  He noticed something shiny sticking out from beneath the bloody mattress and bent to pick it up. It was a small pair of scissors. Not nail scissors. Larger than that and of better quality. He carried them over to the window. They were engraved with vines and flowers.

  “She probably used those to cut the cord,” Kelly said.

  Yes, she would have had to do that, Gus realized. It was hard to imagine a woman being alone at such a time—a young woman who’d never given birth before. And with all that blood. She must have been very frightened.

  What had made Jamie Long leave the ranch, Gus pondered. What things had she deduced on her own, and what things had his mother told her? Surely the girl realized that Mary Millicent was as crazy as a loon. But not always. Sometimes she understood exactly what was going on. Sometimes she played them for fools. Gus knew that she could walk. When the Mexican gardener had carried her down the stairs to Sonny’s room, he noticed that the bottoms of her house shoes were scuffed.

  “I remembered one of my men saying that he’d pointed out the McGraf farm to her,” Kelly said. “I drove up this morning to take a look.”

  Gus wanted to be angry. Wanted to yell at Kelly and tell her she should have looked here first. But this wasn’t the only deserted farmhouse on the ranch. He’d paid the back taxes on at least a half dozen of these small spreads and had the occupants evicted. He didn’t like the property of no-count dirt farmers backing up to Hartmann land. Didn’t like their animals wandering onto Hartmann land. Didn’t like them using the ranch store and service station and thinking they should be allowed to attend the Hartmann City church. Didn’t like them tapping into the same aquifer with their wells. Didn’t like them observing the comings and goings at the ranch.