Bittersweet Read online

  “That was it, the last of March.”

  Mam counted on her fingers, naming the months. “Looks like December, or maybe even November.”

  Sarah hugged herself. “Maybe the winter won’t seem so long.”

  Sam called from outside, and Mam gave Sarah another quick squeeze. “I’m so happy for you, Sare. For you and Sam.”

  “Don’t say nothing, Mam.”

  “ ’Course I won’t. The news is yours to tell, and rightly so.”

  “Grandma Tolstonadge.”

  “Oh! My, I hadn’t thought. Sounds just right. Old—but good to my heart.”

  Sam called again.

  “Will you two quit pulling taffy?” Emmanuel added. “Man’s got business in town.”

  Mam helped Sarah into the wagon with elaborate care, twittering and poking her daughter gently in the ribs. Once she caught Sam’s eye and winked broadly; Sam jerked his head back as if she had spit in his eye, but never changed expression.

  Sarah untied her bonnet strings and let the breeze carry them. The sky was a flawless blue, and the fullness of summer swelled under it in shades of brown and green. Underbrush crowded the edges of the wagon track, rustling with small birds foraging for their young, hidden in nests overhead. Oblivious of the damage to her complexion, Sarah lifted her face to the sun and breathed deep of the warm, scented air. Cupping her hands over her stomach, she petted it. Sam stared out between the horse’s ears, his eyes fixed on nothing, his chin echoing the dogged tread of the cart horse. Glancing at him, Sarah smiled a secret smile to herself.

  As they approached a ragged burst of rock, thrusting through the creepers, a cottontail bunny, frightened by the noise of the wagon, darted out from the safety of the brush. The dog bounded from between the rear wheels and caught the terrified animal in its jaws.

  “Sam.” Sarah grabbed his arm. “You’ve got to stop.”

  Sam Ebbitt looked over at his young wife and pulled up on the reins.

  “Dog’s got a rabbit, Sam.”

  He leaned across her to look. “His rope tangled in something?”

  “Take it away from him,” she pleaded.

  “Rabbits are thick this year, Sare. Be eating the crops.”

  “Please.”

  “Why’re you taking on over a rabbit? You’ve cleaned and et ’em plenty of times.” He clucked to the horse.

  “Please,” she begged.

  Sam blew air noisily out between loose lips and, shaking his head and muttering, climbed out of the wagon. “C’mere, boy. Lemme see what you got.” The dog looked suspiciously over the inert form of the rabbit and growled. Sam cuffed him. “You don’t by-God growl at me.” The dog dropped the rabbit and ran under the wagon. “Looks like the neck’s broke, Sare. No sense wasting it.” He whistled and the dog pricked up his ears.

  “Wait.” She jumped from the wagon and scooped the little body from the ground. “It ain’t dead, Sam, feel.” He laid a finger on the rabbit’s neck where a pulse beat rapidly. “Just stunned, you think?”

  “We been long enough now. Leave it be.”

  “Let me take it. It ain’t dead, Sam.”

  “Leave it be now. We fiddled enough of the day.” Sarah held it cradled in her arms. “You don’t have to let the dog have it if you don’t want to,” he conceded. She walked back down the road and put the bunny out of reach of the dog, under the overhanging brambles of a chokecherry bush.

  “Sare,” Sam said without looking back, “I said enough now.” She ran back to the wagon and scrambled onto the seat.

  Sam let her off in front of Imogene’s. As soon as his back was turned, she caught up her skirts and ran up the path. Clay had pounded planks into the earth that spring to give Imogene footing through the mud, and Sarah’s boots rang loud on the wood. Pulling up the latch of the door, she threw it open. Imogene was standing in the middle of the room; she turned when the door banged.

  Sarah was through it and in her arms in a moment. “Imogene!” she cried. “We’re going to have a baby!”

  “Sarah, that’s wonderful!” Imogene hugged her and held her away, resting her hands lightly on the girl’s narrow hips. “We’re going to do this right.” She pulled her nose thoughtfully, her face grave. Sarah waited while Imogene paced, lost in thought.

  “Shall I put on some water to boil?” Sarah asked in a timid voice.

  “Not yet.” Imogene looked at her and smiled for the first time since she’d received the news. “I think we’ve got a few months yet. We will learn. Everything.”

  “I meant for tea.”

  Imogene went with her into the kitchen and was measuring tea into the pot while Sarah put the kettle on. She put the canister down with a bump and turned to the young woman. Sarah was kneeling in front of the stove, striking a match. “Sarah, you must promise you will send for me the minute you feel anything. The moment. You must promise to make someone come for me.”

  The kindling caught and flared up. “I’ll send for you, Imogene.”

  Imogene knelt and took her by the shoulders. “Promise.”

  “I promise.”

  “There are other things, too. We should start now. You mustn’t let Sam make you do heavy work. And maybe you should eat certain things. I don’t know.” She stood and brushed off her skirts. “I’ll find out. I’ll get books.”

  Sarah put the kettle where the blaze was highest. “Women have babies every day. You oughtn’t to worry so.” She pulled her small mouth into a stern line, but still she looked pleased. “I’m going to have to call you Papa Grelznik.”

  They carried their tea into the front room and settled themselves near a window where the breeze blew in.

  “I’ve wanted this so much,” Sarah said. “When I was coming into town today, sitting up there beside Sam, I couldn’t help thinking I’d stole something from him. All those times he thought he was taking from me, I was really taking from him.

  “Something’s mine. My baby. I look at everything—trees and birds, everything—and I feel a part of it. Like I was always skimming along just above, and now I’m down in it.” She smoothed her hands over her belly. “Do I sound crazy? I don’t talk like that in front of people.”

  “You sound a little crazy, but it is lovely. I wish everyone were as crazy as you.” Imogene laughed uncertainly. “Papa Grelznik will take care of you, then it will be my baby, too. Would you mind?”

  Sarah took the spinster’s hand and pressed it to her stomach, though it was far too soon for life to show. “I wouldn’t mind.”

  Sam came for Sarah at six o’clock, and she took her place beside him. Imogene watched until a bend in the road took them.

  “You forget your packages?” Sam asked. “I ain’t going back for them now. It’ll have to wait till next trip.”

  “I never bought anything.” She waited for a reply, but none was forthcoming. “Don’t you want to know why?”

  “You don’t want a new dress, that’s your business.” Sam sounded nettled.

  “I never got to the dry goods. I was talking with Imogene. The whole time.” Sam wouldn’t take his cue. He squinted uninterestedly, eyes front. The sun’s last rays, knifing through the trees, barred the road with orange light. “Don’t you want to know what we talked about?” Sarah asked.

  “You’re going to tell me anyways.”

  “I’m going to have a baby.”

  Sam looked over at her and a slow smile illuminated his beard. He slapped his knee and the horse put its ears back. He reached over and slapped Sarah’s knee. “Good girl.” Smiling, he lapsed back into silence. As the sun touched the horizon, he addressed her again. “You going to have a boy?”

  “I don’t know.” Sarah’s brow furrowed. “I don’t know, Sam.”

  “You have a boy and I’ll get you a present. A cart and your own pony to pull. You have a boy.” Smiling, he slapped her knee again.

  The wagon jolted around a bend in the road, bypassing the rock that had sheltered the rabbit earlier. The dog ran to thrust his long
nose into the tangled underbrush where Sarah had hidden the cottontail. Whimpering with excitement, he pushed his face deep into the bushes but emerged empty-mouthed.

  “Something must’ve got it,” Sam said.

  “Nothing got it. It came to and ran away.”

  Stars were starting to appear low in the sky; pinpricks of light in the summer-green evening. A chorus of crickets fiddled to the song of the frogs. Sarah untied her bonnet and pushed it off, letting it dangle down her back.

  “Nothing got it.” Leaning against the low backrest, humming softly to herself, she watched the stars come out.

  12

  THROUGH THE SUMMER AND INTO THE AUTUMN, SARAH’S PREGNANCY progressed. Sam, excited by his coming son, hired a woman to take over the heavy chores. Sarah spent the free hours the woman afforded her with Imogene, sewing tiny shirts and gowns and walking in the woods near town, planning and dreaming for the child she carried.

  The memory of Mary Beth’s lifeless face haunted Imogene, but she hid her fears and gloried in Sarah’s good health and joy.

  In the middle of a November night, a sharp rapping woke Imogene. Groping in the dark, she dragged a shapeless blue robe over her nightgown and hurried to the door. Walter Tolstonadge stood on the steps.

  “Is it time?” Imogene asked.

  “Sam said she’s been having the pains for an hour, maybe two. Mam sent me to fetch Mrs. Thomas. I’m sorry to be getting you up like this, but Sam said Sarah’s wanting you to come.” Though Walter had learned stoicism over his father’s knee, he couldn’t keep the tremor of nervous excitement out of his voice.

  “Quite right. Thank you for waking me. I’ll be just a minute.” She left the young man standing at the door and, lighting a candle, ran back into the bedroom. Beside the bed was a small bag, already packed. Imogene dressed hastily, snatched up the bag, and joined Walter outside. “A half-minute more,” she told him. In her bag was a placard reading NO SCHOOL TODAY. She tacked it onto the schoolhouse door.

  Lizbeth sat in the back of Sam’s carryall, wedged between Mrs. Thomas, the midwife, and her daughter, Valerie. Imogene rode in the front beside Walter. A freezing wind scoured the night clean, and stars, undimmed by a moon, hung close to the earth. Several inches of old snow covered the ground, crunching under the wheels. Imogene buttoned her cloak beneath her chin and turned the collar up. Walter offered her half of the coarse blanket tucked around his knees. As she took it, Lizbeth crawled over the seat to sit with them.

  Leaning against her mother’s shoulder, Valerie snored, a purring sound. “Wake up now,” Mrs. Thomas said testily. “Ain’t it just like a baby to come along in the middle of the night. It must be close on one o’clock.”

  “It’s somewhat past ten,” Walter corrected.

  “Hmph. Feels later. Will be, before this baby is ready to come into the world, I can tell you that. First baby. Mightn’t be born till late tomorrow. Maybe not even then. Not much hips on the Tolstonadge girl. I guess I’d best be saying ‘young Mrs. Ebbitt,’ considering. Hardly enough room for what’s been in, let alone room for a baby to get out.” The midwife had a good laugh at her own joke. Valerie snorted herself awake under her mother’s prodding. “You stay awake, girl. Time you was learning midwifing. A trade’s a good thing for a girl that mightn’t marry young.” Unoffended, Valerie settled her fat behind more comfortably on the seat and looked around with sleepy eyes.

  “My Val’s helped out before.” Mrs. Thomas directed her stream of chatter at Imogene’s back. “But it was all easy birthings. She ain’t never seen what can go wrong. Baby all ’round the wrong way and not wanting to come out at all—sometimes the little things get theirselves so twisted up they just tear the life out of them that’s having them. Make themselves orphans before they’re rightly born. You ain’t seen nothing go wrong,” she told her daughter, “and that’s, of course, what a midwife’s needing to know. The rest of the time you need hardly be there. Folks’ll have them by themselves if you’re late. I’ve seen it happen. They’ll holler for you loud enough if something goes wrong. Except the fever, there’s nothing you can do for that. Fever’s God’s will, is all. Gets a lot of babies and their mamas with them.” Valerie had pulled a bit of bread from one of the pockets in her cloak and now munched it placidly. Imogene, her spine growing rigid under the flow of words, swallowed hard and wiped her hands on her handkerchief. Lizbeth had snuggled close to her for warmth and comfort.

  “Sister going to die?” she asked, near tears.

  “No. She will not die,” Imogene declared. Her vehemence startled the child and silenced the voluble Mrs. Thomas.

  At the farm, lights were burning in the kitchen and the upstairs window. Imogene jumped to the ground before the wagon came to a full stop, and hurried into the house.

  Upstairs, lying in state, propped up by pillows, Sarah was talking cheerfully with her mother and Gracie. She wore a new bed jacket and her hair was tied back in the blue satin ribbon Imogene had bought for her. A fire burned merrily in the little fireplace at the end of the room, and lamps and candles brightened the walls. Sarah had a patchwork coverlet over her lap, and on the dresser were teacups and little cakes her mother had made. Mam knitted in a broad chair by the fire.

  The bedroom door banged open, setting the dresser mirror swinging, and Imogene stepped over the threshold. With her hair still disheveled from her bed, and her lips squeezed white between a frost-red nose and chin, she looked fearsome. Conversation stopped and three pairs of eyes turned toward the door.

  “Miss Grelznik, you look like the devil himself been chasing you,” Gracie exclaimed.

  “What’s wrong?” Alarmed, Sarah pulled herself farther up in the bed. “Is there something wrong?”

  Shamefaced, Imogene closed the door and shrugged off her cape. She crossed to the bedside to take Sarah’s hand. “I had myself worked into such a fluster that by the time we got here I was ready to deliver the baby myself the moment I stepped through the door.”

  Mam smiled. “It’ll be a bit yet. Edna here?”

  “And Valerie,” Imogene replied.

  “I’m glad you’re here,” Sarah said. “I guess Walter did drag you out of bed. I told Sam to make him promise, but I thought Walter’d go scaredy-cat anyway. Would you like some tea?” Imogene nodded gratefully. “Gracie, would you run down and brew up a fresh pot? Make plenty; I hear Mrs. Thomas and Valerie on the stairs, and I expect they could use a little warming up.” Sarah was serene in the role of hostess.

  “It feels like a party.” Imogene squeezed her hand. Margaret smiled but said nothing.

  A great deal of wheezing and puffing announced Edna Thomas and her daughter. A timid knock on the door was drowned in a gust of voice. “For heaven’s sake, Sam, there’s no need to knock at your own bedroom. You been here before, or you’d not be needing my services now.” Mrs. Thomas pushed through, and Sam retreated back down the stairs, into the company of Emmanuel and Walter.

  Mam called him back. “Sam, would you tell the boys they can go on home now? Most likely I’ll be here all night and a good part of tomorrow. There’s no sense in them losing sleep. They have to work in the morning.”

  “Ma, one’s coming,” Sarah cried and, holding her breath, clutched Imogene’s hand. The schoolteacher held tight and stroked the young woman’s arm.

  “They’re coming right along,” Mam said to Mrs. Thomas.

  When it had passed, Sarah lay back against the pillow and smiled. Imogene was visibly shaken. “It’s not so bad. Not for a baby,” Sarah reassured her.

  Gracie returned with the tea, Lizbeth carrying the cups, and the women settled in. They talked quietly, giving Sarah the support of their affection and the comfort of their experience.

  Sometime after midnight, Sam, armed with blankets Mam had unearthed from the hall closet, bedded down on the living room floor.

  The hours crawled by and Mam sent Lizbeth across the hall with a comforter and pillow to make herself a nest on the cot Sam had slept in as a chi
ld. The room would serve as the nursery when the baby was older. Margaret let her take a lamp to leave burning low to chase the goblins from behind the piled boxes and dusty trunks.

  Through the dark morning hours, Sarah strained and cried. Just before sunrise, Sam left the house. Imogene watched him from a high window—a small, dark figure under sullen skies. He was burning brush today. Mam sent Mrs. Thomas and Valerie downstairs to get some sleep, and settled in the chair by the fire to nap. Imogene wouldn’t leave the room. She read aloud to Sarah, sitting on a hard stool so she wouldn’t doze.

  Lunch came and went, Sam eating cold meat alone in the kitchen, Mam and Imogene eating sparingly in the bedroom and trying to coax Sarah to take a little food. Downstairs, the Thomases still slept. Grace and Lizbeth, grown tired of waiting, had wandered outside to play.

  Near three o’clock that afternoon, Sarah’s labor neared its end. Gray had replaced the red in her cheeks, and her damp hair lay close to her head. Another contraction wracked her; she bit down, trying not to scream. When she lay back, Imogene wiped her forehead with a cool cloth. Mrs. Thomas folded back her nightgown and kneaded her stomach, her dusky fingers, engrained with the dirt of years, expertly prodding the strained flesh. Sluggish with sleep and a natural dullness of mind, Valerie watched over her mother’s shoulder, obeying commands to feel here and notice there. The girl’s plump hands were less grubby than Edna’s, but only from lack of time. As the examination progressed, Imogene grew increasingly agitated. Finally she laid her hand on Mrs. Thomas’s arm.

  “I must ask you to wash.” Edna looked up without comprehension. “Your hands. You must wash your hands and arms. Valerie too, if she’s to touch her.”

  “For heaven’s sake,” Mrs. Thomas huffed, “of all the nonsense…”

  “You must wash before you touch her again,” Imogene insisted quietly, her fingers closing on the other woman’s wrist. Mrs. Tolstonadge looked on in silence, and obvious disapproval. Sarah sucked in her breath as another wave of pain built.