Widow 1881_Flats Junction Series

by Sara Dahmen

  “Gloucester. Jesus,” I hear him swear lightly under his breath. We stand outside his door, facing one another. He stares at me, as if deciding whether an argument now is worth his time.

  “It seems damn foolish,” he bites out bluntly. “Here you are, all trained in the ways of country nursin’, knowin’ my patients and the pace of my days, and you’re leavin’?”

  “It’s a good opportunity,” I tell him, and that part is true.

  “You’ve decided you don’t need this now, is that it?” he asks, gesturing to the slope of his roof and the squat houses of the neighbors. “Now that you’ve lost the babe, you have no need to hide from your family and your fancy Eastern city. I thought you better than that. I thought you preferred it here. I . . . you can teach yourself here. I won’t stop you from readin’ my medical books. I won’t question you furtherin’ your education.”

  He speaks to my heart, my nature, while at the same time his accusation is the worst pain of all, for it is far from the reality. How I desire to tell him of my emotions! How I wish I could shove past the vestiges of learned respectability and take him up on his offer to stay! But stay as what? The housekeeper? When every particle in my blood screams to be his lover?

  “You’re very kind. Too kind to me,” I say. “But it’s for the best.”

  “Well, Mrs. Weber,” he says after a long moment, and I cannot read the feeling behind his tone. “I did not expect this of you, though I suppose I can’t force you to stay if you feel you truly must go.”

  “Then I’ll get to packing tonight, so I might say some goodbyes tomorrow.”

  He does not meet my eyes, and walks away down the small yard into the street toward Kate’s welcoming porch. The evening chill descends quickly as the sun sets, but I do not go in and pack. I watch him walk away from me, his lightly striped shirt sometimes grey in shadow, and other times washed a brilliant rose in the late sunset.

  I hope I will have a memory of him always, regardless of what my future holds.

  Chapter 28

  3 November 1881

  “But you could work out here,” Alice Brinkley urges. “I’m sure Sadie Fawcett would love to be the only one in town with a live-in cook, and Tom can afford it.”

  “No.” I shake my head, though I smile at her earnestness.

  “Well, I still don’t see why you should rush off when it’s not even settled between the doc and Kate. Their courting could go on another year or more.”

  “I’d have to look elsewhere to find a job when they do wed. There is an opportunity now. You understand, Alice? I don’t wish to be redundant.”

  She sighs and presses a small wrapped cheese for the journey into my palm. At least this time, I will not be with child on the train.

  We give a teary goodbye to each other, and we promise to write. I will miss her cheery ways, even though I did not get to see her as often as I would have liked.

  As I walk back to town, I look at Flats Junction, spread out in dun-colored sunlight. Many of the homes are familiar to me. I know the families and children who live in them. Most have been kind, welcoming, or at the very least, cordial. It is obvious that without even trying I have found a little place for myself. If I had a choice, I would set up a home of my own, where I might look after myself and the doctor, as would be fitting. I’d have Widow Hawks stay with me, if she wished. Dreams.

  The edges of the town meet prairie suddenly, and the dusty land is pocketed by small holes filled with the little dogs. It’s too soon in the day for coyotes, though I know now they are easy to scare. I think that it is a very lovely town. My nostalgia comes with my leaving it.

  And yet . . . I am still appalled no one searches out the arsonist who burned Widow Hawks’ home. It is probably best that I go. I’d start asking questions, and get indignant at the lack of response. I’d stir trouble, which would be entirely inappropriate and unbecoming of a lady.

  Kate is out on the general’s porch, shooing Horeb and Gilroy off for their supper at the mess hall, though I notice Gilroy goes north to the Golden Nail instead today. I wonder if he’s trying to make eyes at Toot. Everyone knows she’d be quite receptive. Or he’s off to see the coffee mill Trusty Willy has just brought in, which is said to be so new there’s no patent on it yet.

  It is November, but the night is still warm enough that Kate and Doctor Kinney can court in the open air. She is setting the table. I find strange solace in the idea that he will be well looked after.

  “Kate,” I call. I stand at the bottom of her stairs, just like I did the first morning I arrived in Flats Junction. She gazes down at me, but her eyes are not shrewd this time. She seems in a good mood, and comes down to where I am waiting, taking my hand in hers. News has traveled already, and she knows I am leaving.

  “I’ll miss you.” She gives a small laugh. “Who will help me run all the festivals in town now?”

  “I should think that you’ll manage splendidly.” I cannot bring myself to speak more; she will eventually have Doctor Kinney at her side to help with whatever projects she undertakes.

  “Well.” She gives a shake of her head. “I’ll make sure the doc is fed and cleaned up.”

  “I know you will.”

  “And you’re likely glad to get out of here. We’re just a small, ignorant town compared to Boston.” The forced lightness of her voice hides a tight frustration I can hear anyway. “Aren’t you just lucky to have the money and the ability to leave a place whenever it suits you?”

  She smiles at me, but her eyes are cold, and there are no tears of sadness at my departure. For several months now, I have thought of her as a friend. One with whom I do not always agree, and sometimes her behavior appalls me, but a friend regardless. I believe now she has never really thought so highly of me. Perhaps she will be glad to have me go, if only to speed along the doctor’s expected proposal. Without a housekeeper, he will likely take a wife, finally. Why wouldn’t he?

  “Mrs. Weber!” Doctor Kinney himself appears from inside the general, clambering down the stairs and interrupting us. Kate backs away from me. His hand comes up and touches her shoulder. They glance at each other in a comfortable, familiar way, and she starts back up the stairs.

  “Supper is nearly ready.”

  “Spiced cornbread tonight?” he asks hopefully, and she gives him an exasperated look.

  “You know I don’t do any of that type of cooking, Pat. It’ll be a stew.”

  I know she will never give him the type of food Widow Hawks makes, foods that I would have learned for him so he might have special meals sometimes. But that is his choice. He should understand his sweetheart has no intention of ever doing anything remotely Indian with her life.

  “I was just giving my goodbye.” I nod at him, indicating he can follow Kate, take a seat on the porch, and wait for her to serve him. For all that she scoffed at domesticity when I miscarried, she’s fallen easily enough into the pattern of it.

  He looks down at me and does not smile. “You really mean to leave tomorrow, just like that?”

  “I must, Doctor Kinney.” It is all I can say. Every time I think of leaving him, pain runs through my chest and stomach. Could I tell him I love him even if pressed? I doubt it. The rejection he would give me would be even worse than the relief of honesty on my part. There are times when it is good to hold things close.

  I walk toward East Avenue, unable to glance backward to watch him sit with Kate. As I walk, Douglas and Nancy Ofsberger come out to bid me goodbye, with Douglas’ father calling out from his perch on the post office’s porch. Sadie rushes out for an embrace as well. I’d said farewell to Anette earlier when she left her mother’s house, and I had raised my hand silently at Marie when she opened up her shop. For all my friendships, no one knows how lonely I really am, how much I hate to leave them all, how much I mourn. Our friendships, as tentative and new as they are, are one of the richest, loveliest things to ever happen to me.

  Without caring, I let the screen door slam behind me. The
re are no smells from the kitchen. Widow Hawks is not inside. I can only imagine she is back at the burn pile of her house, or outside in the backyard tending the garden a bit. It is my last night in this place and I find myself wandering the rooms. They are silent, as if waiting for their next adventure, the next womanly hands to touch them. The spigot in the lab shines, the floors are swept and scrubbed without a flake of lye on them. Upstairs, my small trunk is packed and closed, the clothing carefully folded up. I do not expect to need a split skirt in Gloucester, but I will take it nevertheless. I’d asked the doc about repaying him for the clothing and he’d brushed it off, angrier than ever, and I did not dare offer the idea again. My small personal items are tucked in the carpet bag, with the medicine bottle from Doctor Kinney’s prescription, with his dear note, curled inside my best handkerchief.

  I wander into the doctor’s bedroom. It is not so sacred a place to me now. I have washed the man’s clothes, cleaned his bedding, and scrubbed the floors and window. His parents gaze serenely from the portrait on the wall. I know now I like the look of his mother’s eyes because they remind me of his.

  “I love him,” I tell her softly. “I hope that he is truly happy.” My voice falls into silence again.

  In the kitchen, I debate making overnight oats or starting a dough for the doctor’s weekly bread. I should, as one of my final acts as his housekeeper.

  The pantry door creaks slightly when I open it. As I reach for the flour, the grey shadow of yet another mouse streaks behind the sack, and disappears behind the goods. Without a thought, I grab the heavy skillet on the wall by the larder and yank the flour bag back with a violent jerk, giving no warning to the cowering creature. Blindly, I swing, arcing the iron over my head and smashing down with a reverberating force. The collision of the hit with the hardwood floor shoots up my arm, but with the first smack, the tears fall, and the snapping of tiny bones is lost in the aggression of my weeping.

  I cannot manage it, but I must. I do not wish to go, but I will.

  The ironware seems to live in my hand, thick and black and heavy. I bring it down again, harder and faster, unable to truly see in the dimness of the pantry or past the tears. Over and over, faster and fiercer, a relentless banging cacophony, the iron and my arm are one. Strength from hard labor, from a deep welling of remorse and loss, and the inability to understand it all pours from my skin and into the cookware.

  My God! My life! It’s shreds of what it could have been, might have been. Here, in Flats Junction. It is over, and I must start again.

  And again! And again! Again!

  I am so tired of this. So desperately tired of starting again. So lost. Alone. Again.

  I don’t want to leave. I don’t want it. I don’t want this.

  Please.

  The mouse is demolished, a bony smear on the bottom of the skillet, and I’ve split the bag of flour, the seam an ugly, fat, hole pouring grainy globs onto the floorboards. And still I bring the iron down in brutal blows, striking without pause.

  It is too much. It is too much to ask.

  Too much! Not enough!

  I want to scream. Don’t make me leave! Don’t ask me to leave!

  My arm is rubbery, and my tears slow, my sight clearing, yet my blood congests in my head, making it feel as heavy as the iron in my palm.

  The pantry floor is an utter mess, and the bottom of the skillet bumpy with bone and fur and pinky flour-and-blood. Standing slowly, my hands and apron cloudy with white, I inhale so shakily I think I might weep again just by drawing breath.

  When I turn, my heart freezes.

  Doctor Kinney stands at the side of the table, immobile and needle-straight. His face is slack with shock and he seems so appalled he’s beyond language.

  We stare at one another, and I try to dredge up something to say, some way to explain, but pain and embarrassment block my tongue.

  I toss the filthy skillet onto the stovetop, and twitch my fingers along my skirt to flick away the drops of flour. Marching past the doctor, I hike up the stairs and into my bedroom, closing the door against him and his silent judgement, and go to bed early. I don’t want to miss my train.

  Chapter 29

  4 November 1881

  In the morning, I do not bother to make coffee or tea. Widow Hawks will do so. We did not speak much last night when she came into the bedroom, and we said our goodbyes simply. She pressed her forehead to mine, promised to write a bit, and held me tightly as we slept in the small bed. I’ve grown used to her next to me in the sheets, a surrogate mother.

  As I dress, she wakes and watches. We do not speak. It is not a silence that makes me uncertain or uncomfortable, as it did those first few weeks together. Now we are quiet because nothing needs to be said. It is a trait I’ve learned from her without meaning to do so.

  “I will write,” I tell her again. “And I will miss you so much.”

  She smiles at me, accepting of this as well. I pick up my bag and trunk, and walk down the stairs, trying to keep my shoes from making too much noise. I do not wish to bother Doctor Kinney so early. My right arm is sore, but I can bear it. How amazing is it to have the strength to carry the small trunk? I have grown heartier to be sure.

  The town is quiet, though I know it will pick up as soon as the train comes in. No one can really sleep through the whistle of the steam and the cracking of the tracks. Even now, I can hear the engine making its way through the prairie, though it is not quite in sight. The platform is empty, and Franklin Jones takes my money with his only arm, frowning and irritable. Wagons creak through the streets. Farmers are bringing fall produce to be sent down the rails and sold at the bigger towns along the way, some bring livestock.

  There is a hoot and a whistle, and the black engine grows from the land, tiny and dark, looming bigger by the minute. I cannot believe how recently I came here, and yet I will leave Flats Junction already. Now that I am on the brink of the next journey, the time here seems both longer and shorter than the reality. So much has happened. I have learned depths of my strength, of my abilities, and my tolerance. I am wiser, worldlier.

  The train shrieks as it slows and then comes to a full halt, waking most of the town with this last, bone-crunching sound. There are shouts of men suddenly, and a general scurrying. I take a step toward the passenger car just as the brogue cuts through the noise.

  “Mrs. Weber!”

  I turn and watch the doctor hurry toward me. He does not even have his hat, so he must have sprinted out without pause, and has barely has adjusted his clothes; the train’s sound must have woken him moments ago. There is a moment of foolish, ridiculous hope. Has he come to stop me, to keep me here?

  It doesn’t matter. I could not do it, even if he asked. I could not watch him court Kate, and marry her. Heat floods my face when I think of him standing in the kitchen yesterday. How long had he watched me smash about his pantry? I’m glad I can leave, and don’t have to hear his questions.

  “Mrs. Weber.” He comes in front of me, gazing down with something between confusion and hurt across his face. “Did you mean to leave without sayin’ goodbye?”

  “I didn’t want to wake you, Doctor Kinney.”

  He runs an agitated hand through his dark hair, still tousled from sleep. “Are you sure you’re well enough to travel? No more dizzy spells?”

  “I can manage it,” I say placidly. “I did before.”

  “I know it,” he says resolutely, then stops fidgeting altogether and looks hard at me. I am too distraught to really glance up at him, though I feel him inch toward me, as if he wants to give me a hearty embrace. I wish he would, but there are too many people on the platform and below it, and such warmth would be unseemly in so public a place. Or maybe he wants to chastise me for my uncommonly vicious behavior. I jump into the conversation before he can.

  “Well, then,” I say. “I have told Esther I will write. You might learn of my adventures through her if you like.”

  “Mrs. Weber.” He says my name again, then
stops, and speaks so softly I can barely hear him over the steam and shuffle around us. “Jane.”

  My head comes up. I want to kiss him. I turn my face to look at the train instead.

  The whistle blows, sharp and shrill and screeching.

  It is my signal to leave Flats Junction.

  “Goodbye, Doctor Kinney,” I say, and I smile at him tightly, for my smile is not very sincere. “I wish you much happiness here.” This I mean truthfully. “Thank you—for saving me, for giving me work when I needed it. Thank you.”

  I turn, going into the train and finding a seat among the many empty ones before he can catch me with another word. I choose a place on the opposite side of the car, so that I do not need to watch the platform. Slamming my trunk at my feet, I look out over the prairie, where Widow Hawks’ house is a black wound.

  I like to imagine him standing there, watching the train leave, when in all actuality, he probably walked away as soon as I boarded.

  This way, I will never know.

  Gloucester

  20 March 1882

  Chapter 30

  20 March 1882

  I like the little cottage I live in, and my employers, though exacting, are kind. Time here in Massachusetts seems to slip by a little quicker each week. I eagerly wait for warmer spring days when the beaches will heat up, the ice floes will melt, and I can walk the sandy stretches and listen to the waves.

  My Aunt Mary, while elderly, is thrilled to have family in Gloucester. I know all her friends, and I have met some of their granddaughters. Rose Albin, a lovely girl several years my junior, is not yet married, so we make time for tea once a week to discuss her coming wedding plans. It’s not my favorite idea of chatter, but it’s what’s expected of me.