The Midwife of Hope River

I pull my long, straight hair away from my face and continue my plea for help. “I was hoping you could just give me some advice. I’ve been milking Moonlight every six hours the last few days and using warm compresses, but one of her teats is swollen and painful and now she’s not eating. If you have any salve, I could work in trade.”

One corner of the man’s mouth turns up, and he raises his eyebrows as if he thinks my work wouldn’t be worth much.

“Dr. Hester!” A woman, wearing a flowered apron, leans out the back door. “Phone call.”

The vet lays down his hammer and strolls toward the house. “Wait,” he commands.

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly, looking around. I’m not sure what I expected, but some kind of neighborly welcome would have been nice. Maybe I should have come by the road and dressed like a woman. I find an empty bucket and turn it over for a seat, wishing I’d just stayed at home.

While I kill time, I survey my surroundings. The open door of the barn reveals an old tractor, and the smell of hay and manure drifts through the yard. Parked in the drive is a newer-model black Ford covered with dust and mud. The woman watches me out the kitchen window; his wife, I suppose. I nod, and she ducks back from the glass.

When Hester returns, approaching from the side, I jump up. He walks softly with a little limp, like maybe he has a sore knee.

“Let’s go.” He’s carrying a small bag and a wooden box and has a canvas jacket thrown over his shoulder.

I frown. “I can walk home.”

He’s already hurrying toward the vehicle. “I’m not taking you home. We’re going to Clover Bottom to deliver a foal.” I hear by his clipped accent that he’s not from Appalachia. No drawl or nasal twang like many of the natives.

“Clover Bottom? That’s over eight miles.”

“Afterward I’ll see what I can do for your cow.”

“But I don’t have the five dollars . . .”

“If I need you for an assistant, this can be your payback. Do you have small hands?” I stare down at my work-roughened mitts. They’re narrow with long fingers, not especially dainty but good for the work I do. I observe his wide hands in leather driving gloves.

“They’re smaller than yours. But what if you don’t need me?”

“Then you’ve wasted your afternoon and you’ll still owe me for the home visit.”

I climb into the Ford. What else was I planning for the afternoon, anyway? Not much. I have a few hours before Moonlight needs milking. Maybe this excursion will be interesting. As strange as it sounds, I’ve never seen anything born but humans. Not even kittens.

“So where were you trained?” Hester asks, making an effort to be civil as we bump over Salt Lick, where the creek runs clean and clear over the rocks.

“Pittsburgh,” I lie, knowing he means at what midwifery school. It isn’t a complete fib. I did apprentice a little with Mrs. Kelly when we lived there. “For two years,” I add, hoping that will be the end of it.

“I went to University of Pennsylvania.”

La-di-da! I say to myself. But I ask in an interested voice, “What made you want to be a vet?”

I expect him to answer, “I like animals” or “My father was a vet.”

We hit a big pothole and jolt up in the air. “I volunteered for the Great War early in 1917, fresh off the farm, only in my twenties, and was assigned to be a driver and take care of the livestock. It was hell for the horses. They stumbled through mud and rain to bring us supplies, food, water, and ammunition. I watched them die of exhaustion, broken bones, bloody wounds, and tetanus. There was nothing we could do. They should never have been there. Modern weapons made them sitting ducks. Eight million died in combat . . . Eight million beautiful horses. Most people don’t know that.” He has a strong jaw with a big nose, a manly face but not overly handsome. He flashes me a look out of gray eyes, yellow around the middle. Then he lets out his air and drums on the steering wheel.

“Seeing them suffer was almost worse than seeing men die. At least the soldiers, whether they volunteered or were drafted, knew why they were sacrificing. The horses had no idea, and it was sheer terror for them. They gave up their lives for a cause but never knew what the cause was. In the end, I forgot the cause too. Maybe war is always that way.”

He says all this as the terrible sights and sounds roll like a picture show in the back of his mind and I watch the side of his face as he talks. If he served in the military in 1917–1918, he’d be about my age. I’m just beginning to warm up to him when he changes the subject.

“So you’re the midwife that thought the MacIntosh infant was stillborn.” One corner of his mouth twitches up like he thinks this is funny.

My breath is knocked out of me. “Yes.”

How dare he ask such a question? It’s easy to make judgments when you aren’t in the birthing room. He wasn’t the one who knelt by Katherine’s bed and frantically searched over her abdomen with the fetoscope for that quiet tick-tick. He wasn’t the one who’d had to call tall, silent Dr. Blum and ask for a second opinion. He wasn’t the one who had choked back her own tears as she told the parents that their long-awaited baby was dead.

Hester glances over, waiting for a response, but my jaw is clamped shut and we drive the rest of the way in silence, across the stone bridge over Hope River, down Main and through town.

Liberty is a small settlement of some two thousand souls that looks like a village that comes with a wind-up train set. Main Street is populated with two-story shops and a water tower next to the wooden train station. There’s a bank on one corner, a pharmacy, and a courthouse. There’s the engine and coal cars waiting on the tracks that runs along the Hope River. No stoplights, just a stop sign at the corner of Chestnut and Main. It takes about five minutes to traverse the whole town.

Out into the country again, following Route 92 and the B&O Railroad tracks, Hester breaks the quiet. “Did I say something wrong?”

I pull my gold timepiece out from under my wool jacket and flip it open. “It’s already three. I’m a little worried about Moonlight.”

“I’ll get you home well before dark.”

“No, I mean Moonlight, my cow.” I’m still not looking at him. “That’s her name. I’ve been trying to keep her udders empty by milking at least every four hours.”