The Midwife of Hope River

Standing on the wooden porch, I knock twice as Maddock pulls away in his truck and am surprised when Mrs. Wade answers. Not her again, Hardman’s sister, the woman who drove me crazy at Prudy Ott’s birth!

“What took you so long?” she begins by way of a greeting. “We’ve been worried sick.” Behind her, five people sit at a round oak table, just finishing supper. Lilly, the young pregnant woman, a tall redhead, stares blankly at a space over the stove, but her face is turned our way.

“Oh, Patience,” she says with a laugh. “We’re so glad you’re here. Mother’s been fretting all day, but I’m fine. These are my parents, Mr. and Mrs. Wade, my uncle Billy Hardman, and of course B.K. Is Bitsy here too?”

“Right behind you.” My friend has already moved into the room. She puts down the birth satchel and touches Lilly on the shoulder as Lilly reaches up and hugs her. If Mrs. Wade is still offended by the color of my partner’s skin, she knows not to say it. To the blind girl we all look the same, just as it should be.

“You smell good,” Lilly says when Bitsy hugs her.

“It must be Patience’s homemade soap. She puts lavender in it.”

“Oh, we must get some for the store, then! Could we, B.K.? Wouldn’t that be lovely? If it wasn’t too expensive, the women would snatch it up.”

“Yes, honey,” says B.K., standing and placing his dish in the sink.

The beautiful redhead stops her chatter and begins to swing her head slowly from side to side. It’s a new gesture to me, but I recognize a contraction when I see one. The room goes quiet, and B.K. steps up behind his wife to rub her shoulders. When she’s done, she rests her head on his stomach. “Thanks, hon.”

“Lordy, how long must this go on?” Mrs. Wade wonders.

“Bertha,” Mr. Wade warns, “it’s the midwife’s job to figure that out. You can take a break now, go back to the spare bedroom, and read.” Bertha slashes him a look but does what he says, clears the table, and stalks out. “I’m going over to my office,” Lilly’s father tells us. “Call if you need anything.”

“I better get a move on too.” That’s Hardman, Uncle Billy. “I came by your place on Wild Rose and waited for a while, but had to get back to town. Maddock bring you? He’s an odd duck . . .” The sheriff doesn’t wait for my opinion but shrugs into his policeman’s jacket. “Give ’em hell, honey!” he encourages his niece.

“I have something of yours, Miss Murphy,” he says to me, then moves out the door.

This can’t be good. “Something for me?”

He nods his scarred chin and tips his head toward the porch. Outside a fog has moved in and silenced the street. Hardman pulls out a yellow sheet of paper folded in quarters. “It’s been in my top desk drawer for a long time.”

My hands shake as I take the document and hold it up to the porch light. I’m thinking that this is something I’ve feared seeing someday, a wanted poster with my photo on it.

I’m surprised, when I unfold the parchment, to discover a drawing of a woman who only vaguely resembles me. The hair is dark, they got that right, and there are wire-rimmed glasses, but the face is too long and the almond eyes look almost Asian. An artist has sketched a composite from a vague description.

“Two Hundred Dollar Reward,” the announcement reads, “for the arrest of Elizabeth Snyder, approximately 30 years of age, known radical and union organizer from Pittsburgh. Miss Snyder, an associate of agitator Mother Jones, is suspected of the murder of coal miner Ruben Gordesky of Matewan. Information about the whereabouts of the suspect can be given to any local law enforcement officer.”

“Almost everything about the notice is wrong.” I look up.

“I know,” Hardman agrees. “Picture doesn’t look much like you, either. That’s why it took me so long to figure it out.”

“I wasn’t an organizer, just a sympathizer. My husband was the organizer, Ruben Gordesky. He was a wonderful man but never a miner. We lived in Pittsburgh, where he worked for the UMWA, and he just came to southern West Virginia to see if he could settle the miners down, avoid a riot. I’m proud of him.” It isn’t until I say Ruben’s name that the tears come. “So what now? What are you going to do? Arrest me?”

“This.” He looks straight at me, rips up the paper, and stuffs it into his shirt pocket.

“And those other lawmen involved? The outsiders. Do they know?”

“They were here on another matter. Revenuers from Pittsburgh. Someone in Union County has been running moonshine into the city. They aren’t interested in Blair Mountain or what happened there. No one else is either. There haven’t been any prosecutions for years.”

I let out my breath and stare down at the gas streetlights. In the fog, they look like they have rainbows around them. “It was the worst day of my life. They were shooting at us. Ruben was down. One of the goons was on him. I was only trying to keep him from choking Ruben . . . and I bashed in my husband’s head instead . . . an accident.”

“I’ve watched you for a year. You’re no killer. Too soft.”

Though I should keep my mouth shut, I can’t let that go by. “Midwives aren’t soft. We are warriors.”

He smiles. “Okay. But you still wouldn’t hurt a fly unless you had to. I can see that. Not on purpose.” He places his hand on my shoulder, a stiff gesture but one of acceptance, and I would like to hug him, but just then Bitsy yells from the bedroom. “Patience?”

“Got to go.” I pull open the screen.

“Give ’em hell, honey.” He uses the same words he used with his niece Lilly. “And tell Bitsy to say hello to Thomas for me. Proudfoot is a good man. After Katherine MacIntosh told me about her husband’s previous suicide threats, I dropped the investigation. Finally closed the case as a self-inflicted death yesterday.”

In the empty kitchen I lean back on the door. By his words, everything in the room has been altered; the light is brighter, the colors more vivid, the shadows less dark.

“Patience?” my partner calls again. I want to tell Bitsy that a great weight has been lifted. I want to tell her that her brother is safe, that the cops are officially done with it, but there’s no time.

“Patience, where are you?”