River of Dust (19 page)

    "Reverend Watson," Mrs. Martin said, finally acknowledging him, "it is best for your wife to rest now. Out we go."

    Mrs. Martin rose and gestured for her small daughter and the Reverend to leave the bedroom with her. Like an ignorant sheep, he turned and started toward the door. The grand, powerful man of previous times appeared withered in his simple black suit. Mai Lin missed his long traveling coat and the enormous hide he had worn on his adventures. She was glad, though, to see that the red sash still hung across his breast, and the pouch with the twin golden dragons swung at his side. Several silver amulets and half-a-dozen pouches remained around his neck on ropes of leather. Mai Lin assumed these talismans re minded him of the man he had once been out on the trail when his hopes had been high and foolish. She liked that man more than the meek soul he was turning into here before her eyes.

    "Mistress Grace wants to see her husband," Mai Lin said abruptly to Mrs. Martin. "She told me so."

    Mai Lin then pinched tight her eyes, and apparently Mildred Martin was not stupid: she recognized the Evil Eye when it was upon her. She lifted her chin, took her toddler's hand, and marched from the room.

    "Really, Mai Lin?" the Reverend whispered. "Did Mrs. Watson ask for me?"

    "Come," she said and gestured for him to join her at the bedside.

    "Mistress," Mai Lin said, and Grace's eyes opened slowly. "The Reverend is here."

    Grace let out a pleased sigh.

    "My darling," he said, and Mai Lin stepped away. The Reverend bent to kiss Grace's hand. "You made the trip across the courtyard like the Queen of the Sheba on a bed of silks. The distance was as vast and treacherous as any I've traversed on donkey back, but you made it like a trooper."

    Grace grimaced and asked, "Are you leaving again?"

    "Oh, no, my dear, I didn't mean to frighten you. I'm staying right here with you."

    A faint smile appeared, then flitted away. "Have you seen her?" she asked.

    "Who?"

    "Our daughter."

    "Why, yes, I have."

    Mistress Grace seemed to wait for more from her husband, but then she carried on. "I have decided to call her Rose."

    He clapped his hands together like a schoolboy, and the cheerful sound echoed strangely in the sickroom. "Excellent. But shouldn't it be Rose Grace?"

    Mai Lin's mistress now fully smiled, and the Reverend kissed her brow. "You sleep now, my dearest, and regain your strength."

    Mai Lin could tell that her mistress was reluctant to release her husband's hand, but she finally did, and Mai Lin escorted him out of the room. In the hallway, the Reverend paused before leaving. He held a new hat in his hands that Mai Lin had not seen before. It was of the type worn by shepherds and tribesmen of the western borderlands— those shiftless nomads who lived on the plains, killed one another randomly, and needed fur to keep their heads warm, even in their sleep.

    "Reverend has a new hat?" she asked.

    His face blushed. "I seem to still have a following. News of the baby leaked outside the compound. One of the chieftains sent this gift all the way from the steppes. I gather it's supposed to bring good luck." He looked hopefully at her and asked, "Do you suppose that's true, Mai Lin?"

    She scoffed and wanted to say something about the superstitious country people, but the Reverend appeared too tender now to understand.

    "Check that thing for lice," she said. "It probably came off a dead man."

    The Reverend inspected the hat. "It is rather terrible looking," he said, but then he went ahead and put it on his head anyway, pulled it low and patted the top. Mai Lin actually smiled at the silly, sorry man who seemed pleased with himself for a change.

    Then she stepped closer and got to the point. "We need your help. Mistress's milk will dry up soon because she doesn't eat enough. Rose Baby is very hungry, but Mistress is too weak. We need animal milk to supplement her supply. Sheep or goat, whatever you can find."

    "Of course," the Reverend said. "I will go at once."

    He started to leave, but Mai Lin called him back. She lifted a silk cord from around her neck. On it hung an amulet: a small inlaid wooden box, and inside the box was a potion that her grandmother, the great healer, had put there herself. If anything could help the Reverend at this point, Mai Lin thought, this charm might, although she wouldn't have bet her inheritance on it.

    The Reverend took the wooden box between his fingers and admired it. He let it fall to his chest, where it hung beside the other necklaces he had been given along the way.

    "Thank you, Mai Lin."

    He then surprised her by bringing his hands together and bowing lower than she in a sign of utmost respect.

    The Reverend turned and scurried down the stairs and across the front hallway. He had made it almost to the door when the Reverend and Mrs. Martin stepped from their parlor.

    "Dashing off already?" Reverend Charles Martin asked. "We never see you anymore, old boy."

    The Reverend apologized and thanked them again for encouraging his wife to convalesce in their home. He said he was most grateful. But then, without further explanation, he pushed open the screen door and hurried off the veranda into the gray late-winter afternoon. Mai Lin watched from the second floor as the Martins followed him with their eyes.

    "Where on earth did he get that hat?" Mildred Watson asked.

    Her bald husband with a hawk's nose shook his head. "When he finally shed the animal hide, I thought he might be regaining his senses."

    "You're too patient, Reverend Martin. That man is head of the mission in name only."

    "Let's not forget that he lost his son not yet a year ago."

    "Others have lost children as well. You need to bring it up with the mission board back home. We must have strong leadership here, not some half native in disreputable garb."

    Mai Lin had to restrain herself from spitting betel quid onto Mrs. Martin's prematurely silver bun. The Reverend Martin put his arm around his wife and tried to kiss her temple, but she brushed him away and went to her young daughter, who was howling like a wild animal from the parlor. Mrs. Martin's daughter was a lousy specimen, too, Mai Lin thought, nothing like the good girl, Rose Baby.

G
race's children came to her in a swirl of dust and sunlight. Motes of light floated behind her closed eyelids, and when she opened them the sun danced low over the sill before her, bringing with it the children. She thought she heard them crying. She dozed and dreamed and woke again and heard them crying again, this time from quite close. She squinted down at the soft bundle beside her. Rose. Her Rose. Grace's heart welled up, but her arms were too tired to lift the baby to her breast.

    "Mai Lin," she whispered.

    The old woman was there, just where she was needed. Grace had never known anyone so reliable. Something cool wetted her lips, and another cool cloth covered her brow. The heat that flamed up at the touch of Mai Lin's fingers startled Grace. She realized she must be terribly ill. That wouldn't do. She pushed herself up in her bed and said, "I shall feed my daughter now."

    "Rose Baby drinks goat milk and tea I combine for her. Reverend brought it to your daughter three days ago."

    "I've been sleeping all that time?"

    "Off and on," Mai Lin said as she withdrew the cloth from Grace's forehead and replaced it with another one.

    "But I want to nurse her, Mai Lin. I must."

    "If Mistress insists, but you must eat, too."

    Mai Lin lifted the baby, pulled back Grace's gown, and helped put the child's mouth to her mother's nipple. The baby rooted and mewed. Grace tipped back her head against the pillow and let out a surprising laugh. The pull of the infant's mouth on her tender skin sent a shooting pain through her, but she didn't mind. Her daughter was alive. And she was alive.

    Mai Lin spooned tea into Grace's mouth and then a mash of beans and something else she didn't recognize. She no longer cared for food except that she knew she must eat it to keep up her strength for the sake of the baby. After another sip, she felt woozy again and wanted to sleep but made herself swallow more.

    The baby pulled back her tiny head covered in thin, pale hair and let out a high-pitched howl. Grace fumbled with her breast and offered it again, but the infant's body stiffened as she cried, her face turning scarlet.

    "What have I done wrong?" Grace asked. "Why won't she take it?"

    "Mother's milk is not enough for her," Mai Lin said. "You hold Rose Baby in your arms. That is better."

    Mai Lin covered Grace's chest and spooned her another mouthful. She then lifted Rose into her mistress's arms and showed her how to feed her daughter from a strange-looking contraption that resembled an urn with a hard spout. As unappealing as the setup seemed, Rose drank the milky liquid.

    "Have we nothing with a softer teat?" Grace asked. "The poor girl has to suck on hard ceramic. This is terrible. I can't even feed my own child properly."

    Grace began to weep so suddenly, she shocked herself. As she cried, her chest grew tighter and she began to cough. She had grown accustomed to the endless paroxysms, but now she could hardly bear the pain they caused to her tender female parts and to her aching ribs. Her entire body was wracked by the coughing, and she realized she hadn't recovered much at all from the birth. She remembered that entire episode only vaguely, as if it were a story of great adversity that had happened to someone else. That is, until she felt the pain again when the coughing cut through her. Then she understood it was she who had endured almost too much to bear.

    When the coughing finally subsided, Grace said to Mai Lin, "I almost took my leave of this world after Rose was born, didn't I?"

    Mai Lin nodded.

    "I remember it now," Grace said. Her dreams and memories of the past weeks flitted past, and she searched them for what had actually happened. It was a haze, but one sensation persisted throughout. "I felt certain it was my time to leave."

    Mai Lin stood over her with a worried expression. "Mistress was in great pain after the baby came, greater even than in birth labor. Something got caught inside. Your body needed to get rid of it and couldn't stop bleeding until you did. But, you are much better now. You will be well again soon."

    Grace looked beyond her amah and out the window into the shadowed courtyard below. Chinese children stood in straight lines before their classroom doors as the ministers and ladies of the mission drifted about in their dark robes.

    Grace let the baby bottle sag in her hand. "But truly, I was ready to leave this life," she repeated, more to herself than her amah. "I wanted to join my other children, the ones out there."

    Mai Lin lifted Rose away from her mother and placed her on her shoulder. Grace did not object. The old woman patted the infant's back and said, "But you would have left this very real small one behind. That would not do. She needs you."

    Grace did not answer but looked out the window again, this time beyond the courtyard to the flat plains streaked by the red fingers of sunset. She could tell she was making her maid uneasy with such talk, but it was true. She had wanted to go. Her time had come. But her daughter was here, and Mai Lin was right to say that Grace must now stay. For Rose's sake, she must hold on a little while longer. She lifted her frail arms, and Mai Lin placed Rose back into them. The baby leaned against her chest, and Grace felt a weight upon her heart. Mai Lin looked down at her with those same worried eyes, and Grace hated to pain her old amah so.

    She attempted to lighten her voice as she asked, "Wherever did the Reverend find the precious milk for our girl?"

    "He wouldn't say. But Mistress knows he is a most resourceful man, yes?" Mai Lin shifted her heavy skirts and sat on the edge of the bed. She appeared to almost be smiling. Clearly her amah was trying to rescue Grace from the dark cul-de-sac of feeling that she had wandered down.

    Mai Lin continued, "He performs many miracles. Everyone knows this."

"Tell me, what do they say about him these days?" Grace asked.

    "This morning," Mai Lin began, "Mrs. Martin's number-one boy told everyone the story of the two bullets. The latest version is that the Reverend caught the bullets in his giant hands."

    "Oh, my!" Grace said. "What else?"

    "Elephants tried to stampede a crowd, but the Reverend stopped them with a clap of thunder and a bolt of lightning that he threw down himself."

    Grace giggled. "I believe it's true."

    "Some even say he charmed the snakes to sleep for one hundred years. And others say he turned dead crops into most satisfying grains."

    Grace lifted her sleepy daughter up before her and rubbed their noses softly together. "Your father is a great man, little one," she whispered. "Never forget it."

    Mai Lin chuckled and said, "I don't believe anyone will ever forget the great Ghost Man who once lived here."

    Grace glanced at her. "What do you mean they won't ever forget him, Mai Lin? He is still with us and well?"

    "He is well," Mai Lin said as she stood abruptly and tucked in the covers at the foot of the bed.

    "And he is with us? He no longer travels the way he once did?" Grace asked.

    Mai Lin stopped fussing and stepped toward the window.

    "Tell me," Grace cleared her throat, "where is my husband now?"

    Mai Lin bowed her head. "He brought us the milk, and then he went away again."

    Grace let out a sharp sigh. She looked beyond the wall that surrounded the mission compound. The yellow dust of the desert reflected the late-afternoon light. All that golden brightness hid the roughness of the roads and the dryness of the lone river. It was a terrible terrain, inhospitable and cruel. And yet her husband was out there somewhere in the vast expanse of desolate land once again. Grace, who normally studied the horizon for hours, couldn't bear to look at it for another moment. She shut her eyes and tried to feel the beating of her baby's heart against her own. It was the one solid thing she knew anymore.