These Healing Hills

by Ann H. Gabhart

  Fran looked out before Coy shut the door. Outside the light was dim as though toward night. She squinted down at her watch. Barely past noon. Maybe the skies would clear a little before she had to find her way back to the center. No time to worry about that now. She had a gunshot wound to treat. Whether or not she liked the patient had no bearing on the treatment.

  Fran laid out the instruments she might need and, with a last glance at the man’s stony face, began. He was as tough as he claimed, and though the boy did keep a firm grasp on his foot, it wouldn’t have been necessary. The man flinched, but he didn’t jerk away as she extracted the bullet and cleansed the wound.

  “An unusual wound,” she said as she stitched it up.

  “That’s ’cause he went and tripped on a root and shot hisself,” Coy spoke up.

  Relief rushed through Fran that Ben had nothing to do with the man getting shot.

  “You talk too much, boy.” The man’s voice was weaker now. “It ain’t like I done it a purpose. Leastways it wasn’t a gut shot. If’n it had been, you might be putting me in the ground beside Pap.”

  “You’re right. That would have been much worse.” Fran packed up her saddlebag. “Leave the bandage on and keep it dry. I’ll come check on it in a couple of days.”

  “Best you not come around agin.” The man fixed his stare on her. “I knows where you’re at if’n it don’t heal up.”

  She hoped that wasn’t a threat. “Then you need to watch it for signs of infections. Red streaks out from the wound or pus. Plus you’ll need the stitches out in a few weeks.”

  “I got a knife.”

  Fran didn’t argue. She was just glad to walk out of the house into the foggy afternoon.

  Coy followed her to get her horse out of the barn. He had brought Moses and not Jasmine. He pointed down the hill. “Head toward the holler. The fog might not be so thick lower down.”

  Fran looked around. She should wait until the fog lifted, but she couldn’t bear the thought of going back in the cabin with Homer Caudill. Coy was right. If she headed down and found a creek, she could follow it and get somewhere she knew.

  “I’d guide you off the hill, but I got to stay here to tend to Pa. He’s mean as a half-starved wildcat, but he’s still my pa.”

  “I understand.” Fran put her hand on his arm. “You’re a good boy. You don’t have to end up like him.”

  “Ma tells me the same. On the sly. Says the Feds are bound to get Pa sooner or later, and she don’t want me to land in jail with him. I’d head off to the mines, but I don’t want to leave Ma up here by her lonesome if’n Pa did come to bad. He don’t let me help him at the still. Him and Pap used to do it all so’s I could stay out of trouble. He ain’t all bad.”

  “That’s good to know.” Fran positioned her saddlebag on Moses and then mounted up. She looked down at Coy. “Is Granny Em’s place near here?”

  “Not so far. West a couple of miles as the crow flies, but that would be rough goin’. Ain’t sure how far if’n you stick to trails. A good piece. In this soupy air, you’d be better served headin’ down the hill. I hear tell you ain’t good with directions, but up and down is easy enough.”

  “You’re right. Down.”

  She started Moses down the trail. When she looked back, Coy was gone. Swallowed up by the fog. Ahead, she could make out a faint path. Nothing for it but to keep going and hope the fog lifted.

  She was going to get so lost. She was already lost. If only Sarge were with her.

  42

  Ben didn’t start down the hill to see Francine until noon. That morning he had to find the old cradle in the barn loft and work on it. Becca should have had him searching that out weeks ago. It wasn’t like baby Carlene was a surprise. He told his mother as much.

  “That’s my fault,” Ma said. “Feels like bad luck bringing the cradle in before the baby. Better to be sure all is well first.”

  Ben frowned. “You made a baby quilt and clothes.”

  “That’s different.”

  “How so?” They were out on the back porch scrubbing the cradle while spatters of cold rain blew in on them.

  His mother stopped working and stared out at the rain. “I ain’t never told you young’uns this, but when I was expectin’ my first, I wanted ev’rything to be perfect. Your pa made this cradle his own self.” She stroked the side of the cradle. “I sat it in the middle of the house months before my laying-in time, and then the baby come too early. Tiny little thing never took a breath. Instead of laying him in this cradle, I had to put him in a box and bury him in the ground.”

  Ben touched his mother’s arm. “I’m sorry.”

  Ma tightened her lips and blinked a few times. “Anyhow, after that, your pa put the cradle out of sight in the barn. The next time I was carrying, I told him to leave it there until I had the babe safe in my arms, breathing and crying.”

  She looked over at Ben a little shamefaced. “I reckon it was silly me carrying over my superstitious fears to Becca, but I couldn’t help myself. I kept telling Becca I’d get around to dragging the cradle out soon. Then when Nurse Howard had to deliver that baby in the truck, I feared the Lord might be punishing me for my faithless superstitions.”

  “Everything turned out all right. Carlene is doing fine.” Ben could hear the baby crying inside the house.

  “It was good the nurse was here.” His mother started scrubbing on the cradle again. “She’s a heap stronger than she looks. Strong in her spirit.”

  “She’s a good nurse.” Ben kept his eyes on the cradle.

  “And pretty.” When Ben stayed silent, she went on. “Becca tells me she had a feller from the city come see her. That she overheard they once considered marrying before the war.”

  “That’s what the man said.” Ben kept his voice level and kept washing the rockers of the cradle.

  After they worked in silence a few minutes, Ma said, “Could be you should go put in your own bid ’fore the man comes down this way again.”

  Ben sat back on his heels and looked directly at his mother, who met his eyes without smiling. After a moment, he said, “Could be.”

  “Good.” The corners of her lips turned up a bit as she bent back to the task of cleaning the cradle. “If’n I was you, I wouldn’t wait overlong.”

  Ben rinsed out his rag in the bucket of soapy water. “She might chase me back up the hill.”

  “Could happen.” Ma didn’t look up, but her smile got a little wider. “But I’m thinkin’ not. She’s a sensible girl.”

  “That’s just it. Sensible would go back to the city where life is easier.”

  “But without the mountains. I’m thinkin’ Nurse Howard has done let her feet grow roots down in these mountains.” Ma looked up at him. “One thing sure. You won’t know if you don’t ask.”

  She shook out her rag and stood up. She put her hands on her hips and stared down at the cradle. “I think we’ve got it in fine shape for my grandbaby. Carry it on in and then you can be on about whatever needs doing.”

  She held the door while he carried the cradle inside. Behind him, she started humming. It took him a minute to recognize the tune. Froggie went a-courting.

  The tune circled around in his head all the way down the hill. It was beyond him why his mother would hum that and send him off courting. No happy endings there. The mouse the frog went courting got eaten by a black snake and a duck ate the frog.

  The rain slacked off into a drizzle, with fog settling down on the mountains by the time he got to the creek. The water was still crashing along, but Captain was a strong swimmer and didn’t have any problem getting across. On the other side of the creek, the horse headed straight for the center.

  Ben heard Sarge barking before he got to the yard. Not his usual bark. Ben kicked Captain to a faster trot. Only a wisp of smoke rose up from one of the chimneys. None from the other. That didn’t look right.

  When barks were the only answer to his knock on the door, Ben pushed it open. Sarge tried to s
hove past him, but Ben held him back while he closed the door. The dog sat down and whined, his ears drooped down.

  “Hold on, Sarge.” Ben made a quick round of the center. Nobody there. The fire was nearly out in the fireplace and the cookstove was cold. Somebody must have come after her, but Sarge always went with her. Always.

  The dog ran back to the door, whining. Sarge wanted to go after her. And why not? Ben could just build up the fire and wait. He could, but what if she was lost in that fog up on the mountain? That girl could get lost in the sunshine.

  She could be in trouble. After all, big black snakes were out there. Maybe not the slithery kind here in late December, but plenty of other dangers. Especially in weather like this, with tides crashing down the mountain.

  Plus, if he sat down and started thinking of all the reasons Francine should choose that city fellow over him, Ben might lose his courage and ride on back up the hill. Tell his mother Francine wasn’t home. That she was probably never going to be home for him.

  You won’t know if you don’t ask. His mother’s words echoed in his head. She was right. He did need to ask Francine if she could ever look on him with favor. Better to know a yes or no so a man could face facts and move on. But first he had to find her.

  As if reading his thoughts, Sarge started scratching on the door.

  “All right, Sarge, let’s go find her.”

  The dog sniffed around the yard and then took off for the creek. Without hesitation, he jumped in to swim for the other side. Ben followed on Captain. The current swept both the dog and the horse down creek. But once on the other side, Sarge put his nose to the ground and after a few minutes headed up the hill.

  “Hope you know a horse can’t always go where a dog can,” Ben muttered as he followed. But then Francine would have been on a horse too. He should have checked her barn. What if both horses were there and she was lying hurt somewhere in the barn? But Sarge wouldn’t be chasing up the hill if that was true. At least, Ben hoped it was.

  At first the dog seemed to be heading toward his house. Francine could have gone to Granny Em’s while he was helping his mother with the cradle. But then the dog took a turn to the east past a few houses without slowing down, even when a dog barked and rushed toward him.

  On past the houses the trail got steeper and rougher. As far as Ben knew, only one family lived up this way. The Caudills. He’d started up this hill a half-dozen times, but something always stopped him. Providence, his mother would say. No need starting a feud when Woody could have been hit by a stray shot the way the sheriff decided. That could have been.

  One of the Caudills might have come for Francine. Homer Caudill’s wife appeared to be beyond childbearing age, but somebody said Homer’s father was poorly. Maybe it was something moonshine couldn’t cure.

  The fog socked down on him like a curtain falling. One minute he could see the dog in front of him on the trail and the next he was swallowed up by gray. Ben slid off Captain and called Sarge. The dog came to him, his tail dragging.

  He kept the dog next to him while he considered what to do. In fog like this, a man could step right over a cliff edge. Even a dog might take a wrong way, although animals generally had a better sense of the terrain than people.

  Ben pulled a rope out of his saddlebag and attached it to Sarge’s collar. “Just while we consider the best thing to do,” he said.

  Surely if Francine had gone to the Caudills’ cabin she would stay there and wait out the fog. But then she might not know how fog could go from bad to impossible here in the mountains in a blink of the eye. Maybe he should go on to the Caudills’ to see if Francine was there, but he wasn’t all that certain he could find the cabin in this gray world.

  Sarge whined and perked up his ears. Then he was back on his feet pulling at the rope. Ben listened but didn’t hear anything except water dripping off the trees. But he turned toward where the dog’s nose was pointing and shouted, “Hallooo!”

  No sound came back to him, but the dog jerked against the rope. Ben took a better hold on it and followed Sarge across the hillside, leading Captain behind him. He held Sarge back and moved slowly to give Captain a chance to find his footing on the narrow path. Sarge dug at the ground to go faster, but Ben held on.

  Then a rock turned under his boot and he slid down the hill. Nothing for it but to turn loose of the rope and the reins to keep the animals from going with him. He grabbed a tree to stop his slide. He scrambled back up the wet hillside to what passed for a path. Captain was there waiting, but Sarge was gone.

  Ben whistled, but the dog didn’t come back. Ben picked up Captain’s reins and headed on along the path. But truth was, he was every bit as lost in this fog as Francine might be if she was here on this hill.

  “What in the world am I going to do now?” he whispered.

  All at once, his father’s words were in his head, clear as the day he’d said them to Ben the week before he left for the army. There’s times in life when no way looks clear. You’re bound to face some of them over there, but when you do, just put your trust in the Lord. He’ll show you a way.

  Ben wasn’t over there now, but the Lord was on this side of the ocean too. He was on this mountain. A prayer rose up inside him that the Lord would point the way.

  43

  Fran kept going for a while in the fog, but then Moses, always the steadier of the horses, tossed his head and stopped. Fran got off and gingerly stepped in front of the horse. The trail disappeared. They appeared to be on some kind of ledge.

  She eased the horse back until she could turn him around. They backtracked to a couple of huge boulders. As good a place to wait out the fog as any. She backed up against one of the rocks and slipped off her slicker to drape between the boulders to make a little shelter over her head. Then she pulled Moses closer to lend her a little of his warmth. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms and stomped her feet.

  “I’m sorry, boy,” she told the horse. “We should have stayed in the Caudills’ barn. But now we’ll just have to wait it out.”

  A house could be just over the ridge and she wouldn’t know it. Maybe even Granny Em’s house. She had the feeling she was going in her direction.

  The thought almost made her laugh. She couldn’t keep her directions straight in the daylight. No way could she know where she was in this fog. What would Granny Em tell her? To listen for the rhythm of the mountain. She held her breath, but she didn’t hear anything except water dripping off the trees. While that might make a rhythm, it wasn’t going to help her find her way home.

  But singing might make her feel better. The song that popped into her head was the one she’d sung with Sadie and Becca. Froggie went a-courting. What a silly song, but at least thinking about it made her smile.

  Her smile faded as she thought about Seth coming courting. She still hadn’t quite wrapped her mind around Seth wanting her to step back to the way they were before the war. Before Cecelia. Before Fran became a frontier nurse-midwife.

  The gray fog pushed in on her. That was how she’d felt when Seth showed up at the center. That he was pushing in on her, not giving her the chance to think about what she wanted to do. Not caring what she wanted to do.

  What did she want to do? With the rock cold and hard against her back, she had the feeling she was leaning against the mountain. That thought made her smile, even with the fog so thick around her that she felt a captive of it.

  She blew out a breath and shut her eyes. If she could be anywhere in the world right at that moment, where would it be? She and Grandma Howard used to play that game. Fran would dream of being in France or on the moon or wherever, but Grandma Howard always wanted to be right where she was on the farm. Now Fran knew how she felt. She wanted to be right here in the mountains, taking care of her people. By a fire might be nice though.

  Not just any fire, but the Lockes’ fire. She kept her eyes closed, letting her imagination go wild. By the fire, her hand in Ben Locke’s with Sarge at her feet.


  She shook her head a little and opened her eyes. That was dreaming. She couldn’t let herself go to sleep and really dream. Hypothermia could sneak up on a person. She stomped her feet again and then rubbed her hands down the horse’s back and up under the edge of the saddle.

  Moses shifted his feet and nickered. He perked up his ears, and then Fran heard it too. Something coming. A bobcat maybe. She could be blocking its den here among the boulders. Or maybe a bear. Her heart pounded up in her ears.

  She had her foot in the stirrup to at least be off the ground and have a chance of escaping whatever was coming when she heard a bark. A dog. She peered toward the sound and saw a flash of yellow fur through the fog.

  “Sarge,” she shouted.

  She stepped back down to the ground as the dog exploded out of the fog. “I can’t believe you found me.” He jumped up on her, his tail wagging almost off, and licked her face. “Did Jeralene let you out? Well, then I guess I’m glad to be lost here in the fog instead of at the Caudills’ where their dogs might have hurt you.”

  See, good can come from everything. Her grandmother was always saying that, and maybe she was right, if being totally lost in the fog and about to freeze could have something good about it. She rubbed Sarge’s head and spotted the rope dragging under him.

  That changed things. Jeralene wouldn’t have put a rope on Sarge. Maybe somebody had tried to come with Sarge. Maybe Woody. Maybe Ben. She looked out at the fog and thought she might see a bit farther than she could minutes ago.

  She cupped her hands around her mouth and hollered the way the mountain men always did when they came after her. “Hallooo!”

  She listened, but no sound came back to her. But then Sarge whipped around and barked. Maybe somebody was there. Somebody who would know how to get down the mountain. She remembered Ben finding her back in the summer, and even not knowing whether Ben might be out there in the fog looking for her or not, her heart started pounding harder again.

  Ben went slow, practically feeling his way through the thick blanket of fog. He looked at his watch. Only half past three. With the rain over, the sun might break through the clouds and burn away the worst of the fog. He got back on Captain and gave him his head to pick the easiest path through the woods.