by Vicki Delany
“You’d better give that girth an extra tug, Aunt Hannah,” Lily advised. “Tigger’s a clever boy and he knows to puff up his stomach at just the right time.” She walloped him on the rump, he blew out air, and sure enough I could tighten the strap more.
Lily swung up into the saddle, and I’d swear Beauty laughed with joy. I mounted with considerably less ease, hopping on one foot, trying to fit the other into the stirrup as Tigger tried to dance out of the way.
Directly above us the sky was as blue as in photographs advertising Caribbean vacations, but clouds, thick and black, were gathering low in the east, portending a break in the heat. I’d added ponchos to the saddlebags in anticipation of rain. We walked slowly across the fields, letting the horses have their heads, the sun baking my legs through my jeans. The moment we entered the green shade of the woods the temperature dropped delightfully. Lily chatted about the various goings-on in her life. Ashley, her best friend and usual riding buddy, had gone on vacation for an entire month. Lily had wanted to be a journalist, like me, but now she was thinking she might be a vet. Did I think being a vet was okay? I did. Charlie, to Lily’s delight, wouldn’t be home from Ryan’s cottage until Sunday night. Lily would like to have a cottage, but it was hardly possible, was it, when her parents were farmers and had to work all summer. Her friend Mary Ann was dating a boy. Lily would like to have a boyfriend, but her mom said she had to be thirteen at least. Did I think thirteen was too old for a first boyfriend?
Boyfriends.
Simon.
Connor?
Connor had been sending strong signals my way, but I hadn’t been interested in responding. I wasn’t ready to enter into a new relationship. I didn’t think of Simon often, and when I did it was with a sense of guilt that I wasn’t deeper in mourning. But aside from that, I wasn’t sure about Connor. He was charming and cheerful, but something lay beneath. He didn’t get on with Jake, probably because he didn’t like taking orders, and I thought I caught the occasional glimpse of pent-up anger and potential violence.
But he did look awfully nice half-dressed and soaking wet.
I gave my head a mental shake and gave Tigger a nudge to get him moving.
We were relaxing on a patch of grass beside a small stream, letting the horses drink their fill and munch on waterweeds, eating our sandwiches when Lily said, “If someone dies without any family, who gets their things?”
Death had been on her mind lately. Understandable in light of Hila’s death and all the turmoil following it. I thought Lily should have been allowed to go to the funeral. To say her goodbyes and begin to move on. But her parents said it would be too upsetting for her, and it was not my place to argue.
“Lots of people leave their estate—that means all their possessions—to charities. Maybe to a close friend or someone who looked after them if they were sick for a long time. Why do you ask, Lily?”
“Just wondering. Hila didn’t have many possessions, did she?”
“No, dearest. She lost everything when her family was killed. I suppose Mr. and Mrs. Harrison will keep her computer and her school books and stuff like that. They might belong to the Harrisons anyway.” I thought of the Koran. The only thing Hila owned. Stolen.
“The Harrisons will inherit her things?”
“I guess so. They were the closest people she had. I don’t think she was in contact with any of her relatives back in Afghanistan.”
Lily picked up a round white stone and tossed it into the slow-moving water.
“Lily, Is there something you should tell me? Or your mother? About Hila?”
At that moment a flock of ducks swooped down to land on the surface of the creek. Beauty started as they flapped their wings in front of her face, and she reared back with a cry. The branch to which she was tied bent. Lily was on her feet, her right hand on the big animal’s neck, her left on the bridle. “Steady, girl. Steady.” She made cooing noses and stroked the horse. Long languid strokes and reassuring murmurs. Beauty stamped her feet but began to settle down under Lily’s loving touch. When the horse was still again, Lily unlooped the reins from the tree branch, put her foot into the stirrup. “Better be going,” she said over her shoulder. “It’s going to rain soon.” She swung herself into the saddle.
I gathered up the picnic remains and stuffed them into Tigger’s saddlebag and mounted with far less grace than had my niece. Lily led the way back to the farm, no longer chatting.
I didn’t have much experience with children—in fact I had no experience with children—and I didn’t know if Lily’s preoccupation with a dead person’s effects was normal. I suspected not. A thought crossed my mind. Something I should do? Something I should say?
Tigger lunged for a patch of grass and I had to pull his head back in line. Whatever I thought I’d had was gone as quickly as it had come.
The first drops of rain began to fall as we left the woods. The black clouds that earlier had been no more than a smudge on the horizon were moving fast in our direction.
Beauty found the path through the tomato fields. Barn in sight, she picked up her pace. The tomatoes were growing rapidly in their neat rows. Some of the plants were as tall as the horses’ knees, sporting green and yellow orbs of varying sizes. I thought happily of the flavor of a fresh cherry tomato, still warm from the sun, on my tongue.
We were about a hundred yards from the barn, me dreaming of heirloom tomatoes cooked into pasta sauce, when Connor came out of the building, yelling.
“Help, help.” He was heading for the house, running flat out. He saw us and changed direction. He waved his hands in the air. Lily dug her heels into Beauty’s side, and the horse leapt forward. They covered the remaining distance at a gallop. I didn’t have to urge Tigger to follow. Connor grabbed Beauty’s bridle. “There’s been an accident. Get to the house. Phone an ambulance. Now.”
“My dad,” Lily yelled, “where’s my dad?”
“Don’t argue with me, just go.” He released the bridle and whacked the horse’s glistening rump. She jumped forward, and Lily raced her to the house, bent low over the long neck. Beauty’s mane streamed behind her. I slid off my own mount. “What’s happened?”
“An accident. Jake. In the barn.”
Leaving Tigger to his own devices, I ran into the barn. Connor followed.
Jake lay on the floor in a rapidly spreading pool of blood. His eyes were closed, and his face was white, and his breathing ragged. I dropped to my knees beside him. “Jake, can you hear me? It’s Hannah. Help’s coming.”
His eyelids flickered, and he was looking at me. “Hannah,” he gasped. “Hurts like hell. My leg. Dammit, Connor, couldn’t you watch what you were doing?”
“We’ve called an ambulance,” I repeated. I ran my eyes down his body. A tear in his right pant leg, at the thigh, the cloth soaked with blood. “Get me a blanket,” I ordered Connor. “Quickly.”
He tossed me a horse blanket, stiff with dust and horsehair. Taking care to keep it clear of the wounded leg, I laid the blanket over Jake’s chest. He needed to be kept warm. I’m no medic, but I did have some basic first aid training to take into the world’s dangerous places. “Another.”
“I don’t see one.”
“A saddle then. Anything to raise his head.”
Connor took an old saddle off the wall. I lifted Jake’s head and Connor slid the make-shift pillow under. Jake gave me a grimace which I took to be an attempt to smile. Nothing was clean enough to use as a compress so I pressed the flat of my hand against the hole in his thigh. Jake gasped but his eyes stayed open. Bright red blood leaked between my fingers. My hand was dirty from the reins and the horse, but the doctors could worry about infection later. More important to try to control the bleeding.
“What happened?” Not that it mattered, but I wanted to keep him alert and talking.
“Fucking C
onnor stabbed me with the fork.”
“A fork?”
“He means the pitchfork,” Connor said. He was standing over me, throwing a long shadow across Jake’s face. “It was an accident. I was in the loft, stacking the new hay and I turned around, not realizing he’d come up behind me, and tripped on something buried in the straw. I must have jabbed it into his leg. He fell.”
I looked up. The barn had a second story, a loft about eight feet up, where hay and rarely used farm implements were kept. A conveyer belt delivered hay from the truck below.
“You mean he fell from up there?”
“Yes.”
If Jake fell from that height, wounded and in pain and shock, he might have done some real damage to his back or neck. I thought, I hoped, the flow of blood was lessening. Under his deep farmer’s tan, Jake’s face was pasty white. His eyelids flickered and closed. “Connor, there should be first aid supplies somewhere on the farm. Do you know where they’re kept?”
“Greenhouse.”
“Get them. I need a clean compress. Everything in here is filthy, including me. “
He ran off.
“Oh, please. No.” Joanne dropped to her knees beside me. Tears ran down her face. “Jake, Jake,” she sobbed.
He blinked. “I’m okay, babe.” His voice was low, each word an effort. “My leg. Hurts like hell.”
“The ambulance is coming. Lily’s waiting at the driveway to bring them down.”
“My girl, Lily.” He lifted his hand and touched his wife’s cheek. She gripped it in her own. Her hands were encrusted with dirt, the nails torn and broken. Good dirt. Farm dirt. Scratches crisscrossed her palms and a band aid was wrapped around her thumb.
My own hand slipped on the wet, sticky skin as I kept the pressure on. “Don’t move,” I barked.
Liz arrived at a run, carrying a big metal box. “Here’s the first aid kit.” She put the box beside me. “Open it,” I ordered. She did. I glanced in. Fully equipped. “Hand me that compress. Take the packaging off first, for Christ’s sake.”
Liz tore the wrapping away and held out the clean white square.
I lifted my hand from the wound; blood oozed but it definitely wasn’t coming as fast as it had been. My right hand was wet and sticky and bright red with blood. I grabbed the compress and slapped it into place.
At that moment I heard the welcome sound of sirens coming our way. A few more minutes, then pounding boots and calm voices. I got to my feet and stood back to let a paramedic take my place. “He fell,” I said, wiping my bloody hands onto my jeans. “From up there.” I took a deep breath.
“I can’t miss any work,” Jake said as the second medic began unpacking a neck brace. “It’s the busy season, you know, market day tomorrow. Wrap up my leg and take me into the house for a rest. I’ll load the market stuff up later. ”
“Shush,” Joanne said, “You need to be checked out at the hospital.”
“What about market?”
“There are more important things than going to the market.”
Lily had followed the medics. She stood with her hand on her mother’s back, her face a mask of fear. I took her by the arm and said, “We’re only in the way. “ We walked out of the barn. It was raining hard now, and a flash of lightening streaked out of the black clouds, followed a few seconds later by a clap of thunder. Tigger was standing in the lettuce beds, munching happily, heedless of the rain streaming down his flanks. “Where’s Beauty?”
“I tied her to the deck railing.”
“I’ll get Tigger out of your mother’s greens. You bring Beauty down and we’ll put them in the paddock for now.”
Lily looked at my hand, smeared red with her father’s blood. “Is Dad going to be okay?”
“He cut his leg badly, but he’s awake and talking. He’ll be okay.”
I went to the equipment shed where yesterday I’d watched Connor cooling himself off. I ran water over my hands. When the blood was gone, most of it, Lily and I gathered the horses and put them in the paddock. A police car pulled up, lights rotating and sirens screaming, followed by another. I ran across the yard to meet them.
“What’s happening here?” the first cop asked. I didn’t recognize him.
“An accident in the barn. My brother-in-law.”
“What kind of an accident?”
The second officer, a woman, headed toward the barn.
“He fell and got a pitchfork in his thigh.” Conscious of wide-eyed Lily behind me, I said quickly, “A bad cut, but nothing more. He’s conscious and his wife is with him.”
“Sounds good,” he said. “We get a lot of calls to farms this time of year. Dangerous places, farms.”
The paramedics wheeled a stretcher out of the barn. Rain fell. Joanne walked beside Jake, holding his hand and muttering comforting words. A couple of chickens, red heads bobbing, provided an escort. I heard Jake say, “Last week we ran out of potatoes early. Be sure you pack extra for us to take tomorrow.”
“Yes, dear,” Joanne said. When they reached Lily and me, standing beside the officer, Joanne stopped. “I’m going with Jake to the hospital. We might be a long time. Are you and Lily okay here?”
“I want to come with you.” Lily began to cry.
“No, dear. There isn’t room in the ambulance and there’s nothing you can do. I’ll call as soon as he’s seen a doctor and we know more. Don’t worry.” Joanne bent over and gave her daughter a tight hug. “Your dad’s a tough old guy. He’s going to be fine. I need you to look after Aunt Hannah. Okay?”
Lily sniffed. I slipped my arm around her thin shoulders. “Call us when you can, eh?”
Joanne nodded and hurried to catch up. We watched as they lifted the stretcher into the back of the ambulance. A hand reached out to Joanne and my sister jumped in. The doors slammed, the second paramedic climbed into the front, and they drove away. Sirens broke the sound of falling rain, and red lights lit up the rain-soaked yard.
The two police officers joined us. The woman had her notebook in one hand and was trying to shield it from the rain with the other. “Can you tell me what happened?”
Water streamed down our faces and soaked through our clothes. The ponchos were still on the horses. “I wasn’t there. Lily and I were coming back from a ride and we heard shouting. I went into the barn and Jake was on the floor. Bleeding badly from his leg. He said he stabbed himself with a pitchfork and fell from the loft. I did what I could to try to control the bleeding and keep him warm and then the ambulance arrived. That’s all I know.”
She made a note and tucked her notebook into her shirt pocket. “Are you going to be okay here alone, Ms. Manning?”
I wasn’t surprised that they knew my name. “Lily and I are going to have hot baths and watch TV or a movie.” I gave Lily what I hoped was a smile. “We might even order pizza for dinner.”
“They don’t deliver this far out,” the cop said.
That punctured my cheerful balloon. “Oh.”
“When will my dad be able to come home?” Lily asked.
“I’m sure your mom’ll call soon as she knows. We’ll be on our way then. Good night.” The radio at her shoulder cackled and she turned away, fingers on the volume.
“Night,” I said.
The police went to their vehicles. Red and blue lights reflected off puddles forming in the driveway and in depressions in the lawn. First one, and then the other, set of lights were turned off and the cars drove away. The wind whipped at my face.
“Come on, Lily. We’re soaked. We need to get inside and change.”
Liz and Allison stood in the shelter of the porch, watching.
“That’s rough,” Liz said, holding the door open for us. “But it didn’t look too bad, right?”
“Right,” I agreed. I kicked off the boots I’
d worn riding.
“I hope Jake’s okay,” Allison said. “Time we’re off, then. See you guys on Monday.” She almost danced out of the house.
Liz gave me a grimace. “Right, a weekend of debauchery for some. What’s going to happen tomorrow do you suppose? Who’ll go to the market?”
“At a guess, no one. Jake certainly won’t be and I don’t think he’ll want Connor going on his own. Where is Connor, anyway?”
She shrugged. “He comes, he goes. I’ll be here tomorrow. I suppose I could take some of the stuff to the market, if they wanted me to.” Allison leaned on the horn of her car. “Coming!” Liz shouted.
I glanced at the clock on the oven as I passed through the kitchen, following Lily upstairs. To my considerable surprise, it wasn’t even six o’clock. With all that had happened, and the dark storm, I’d thought it much later.
Lily showered first and then it was my turn. I scrubbed my hands until I was sure I’d gotten every last speck of blood out and stood under the hot steaming water for a long time. I decided to put on my nightgown rather than get dressed again. I’d try my best to make the evening fun for Lily. Sort of like a sleep-over in her own house. Things would be tough around here for a while. With Jake laid up, Joanne’s time and attention taken, the farm would struggle to get the crops harvested and customers satisfied. Liz, Allison, and Connor could do the work, some of it, but they couldn’t run the business or make decisions and they needed constant supervision. I couldn’t help either, not with the farming, but I could give Jake and Joanne everything I could. I’d hire a nurse, to take care of Jake if he needed it, and we could get a couple of extra farm hands to do Jake’s share of the work. Maybe even a cook, to take some of the housekeeping chores off Joanne.
I combed out my wet hair, pleased with this line of thinking. Joanne would tell me that they’d manage, and Jake would say he wouldn’t take charity, but who cared what they thought.
