The Midwife's Dilemma (7 page)

“Don't thank me yet,” Martha cautioned with a smile. “I still have one more thing I want to ask you to do.”

Victoria grinned. “Anything.”

“Fix the tea. Then we'll talk about it,” Martha suggested, but she was confident that Victoria would not hesitate to grant Martha's last request and wait awhile before marrying. Although she might have to struggle a bit to welcome her daughter's impending betrothal to Dr. McMillan, her daughter's joy was contagious and ignited a happiness in her mother's heart that she could not deny.

But she also knew one thing for certain. She was not going to make the same mistake that her father-in-law had made so many years ago. A prominent and wealthy lawyer in Boston, Graham Cade had disowned his son and only child when he refused to follow in his father's footsteps and instead moved west to follow the life of a plain and simple yeoman farmer. Later, after John had married Martha, his father had never recognized her or their children and continued to refuse any contact with his son or his family.

Until John died.

At the time, Oliver was thirteen and Victoria was only seven. Even then, however, Graham Cade showed virtually no interest in them, except for Oliver. Within a matter of months, he convinced Oliver to join him in Boston, where his grandson was now fulfilling the dreams that he had always had for his son.

It would be hard and it would be challenging, but with God's help, Martha knew that she would let nothing on this earth ever fill her daughter's heart with the pain and grief her husband had carried with him to his grave. Not ever.

Some way, somehow, Martha would have to learn to accept Dr. McMillan not only as her daughter's husband but also as the man who would love and protect her daughter when she was no longer here to do that—assuming Martha could truly come to terms with the notion that it was time to let her daughter go and fully embrace the joy that was pouring out of her daughter's heart and into her own.

R
eluctant to leave the warmth of the fire, Martha remained in her rocking chair while Victoria poured steaming hot water into a teapot. “I know your writing is important, Victoria, but I want you to continue to spend some time each day helping Aunt Hilda, as well as a few hours helping out at the confectionery.”

“I'll help out at home, of course,” Victoria replied. “And yes, I'll help Aunt Hilda, too. As a matter of fact, she asked me just the other day if I wouldn't mind helping out a bit more, just for a few weeks.”

Alarmed by the thought of how devoted Aunt Hilda and her husband were to those beehives of theirs, Martha planted her feet hard on the floor and stopped the chair from rocking. “They didn't ask you to help with those bees, did they?”

“I don't want anything to do with them. I barely tolerate caring for Bird when you're away, and he doesn't sting like they do. But don't worry. She hasn't even mentioned those bees.”

Heavy footsteps drew Martha's attention to the doorway,
where Richard Seymour was just entering the kitchen. Just shy of eighty, he looked much healthier and far stronger than when he'd returned home a year ago. He was still nearly bald, but his once-scraggly white beard was nicely trimmed. The dark blue eyes behind his spectacles were clear and sparkling now, and although his frame was still a bit bowed, he seemed to be a little stronger.

The fact that he was here at all after being gone for thirty years was indeed amazing. Everyone, including Martha, assumed the man had either died or had made a new life for himself elsewhere. Aunt Hilda, on the other hand, had never wavered in her devotion to him, even after burying all four of their children.

When he finally did return and beg for her forgiveness after wasting so many years searching for the fortune he felt he needed to provide for her, she had welcomed him home as if he had only been gone for a fortnight.

To Martha, Aunt Hilda offered a lesson in forgiveness that she would never forget.

Richard paused for a moment when he saw Martha and smiled. “We thought we heard your voice, Martha. Hilda will be right here. Did I hear somebody mention our bees?”

Martha cringed and got up from her rocking chair to greet him properly while Victoria carried the teapot over to the table. “That was me. I was worried that Victoria was helping you with them.”

He returned her hug before motioning her to the table. “No worry there. The bees and the hives are gone,” he told her as he held out her chair for her.

Surprised, Martha took her seat and noted the look of surprise on Victoria's face, too. She waited until he sat down before addressing him again. “Did the bees die?”

“Nothing like that. Hilda took good care of my bees all those years I was gone, but we decided to sell them to Michael Keyes. Apparently, he'd been after her for some time now to get them.”

Martha's heart sank, and she frowned. No more bees meant there would not be any more honey or honey wine from Aunt Hilda, and she knew she wouldn't be the only one disappointed.

Aunt Hilda entered the kitchen. With her thick white braid shaped into a crown atop her head and her dark purple gown, she looked every inch like an aging queen about to join her subjects. She took one look at Martha's frown and gently scolded her husband. “Whatever did you do or say to Martha to upset her?”

Instead of defending himself immediately, he rose, gave her a peck on her cheek and escorted her to her seat at the table. “Just a bit of truth, love. Isn't that right, Martha?”

“He just told me that you've sold all the bees.”

Aunt Hilda waved her hand about. “I suspect it's my honey and my honey wine you'll miss more than the bees, Martha, but don't worry. We made a rather impressive trade with Mr. Keyes to make sure you'll have both, and I doubt Wesley Sweet down at the general store could have done any better, either,” she noted as Victoria added more wood to the cookstove.

Thomas's nephew was known to drive quite a hard bargain with customers, so Martha asked as she began serving the tea, “What kind of trade?”

“In return for the bees and the hives and all of our equipment, we got a fair bit of coin,” Uncle Richard said proudly.

Aunt Hilda grinned. “And I gave Mr. Keyes my recipe for honey wine. I had to do a bit of convincing, but he finally agreed to deliver whatever honey the Lynn sisters need for their larder at the confectionery, and he promised to provide you with all the
honey wine you need to help make it easier for all those young women bringing new babes into the world,” she said proudly.

Hilda then pulled back the cover on the crock of bread pudding and grinned. “Bless you, Martha,” she said before spooning a generous helping onto her husband's plate as well as her own. “Can you hand me your plate?” she asked.

Still a bit stunned by the fact that Michael Keyes now owned all the bees and the hives, Martha didn't realize her aunt had spoken to her until she felt a tap on her hand.

“I asked if you could hand me your plate,” Aunt Hilda repeated.

“I'm sorry. I didn't hear you.” Martha held out her plate and watched Aunt Hilda fill most of it with bread pudding before motioning for Victoria to join them.

“Those griddle cakes can wait,” Aunt Hilda said to Victoria. “Come enjoy this treat while it's still warm.”

Victoria wasted no time obeying, and the four of them shared lighthearted conversation all through breakfast and for a good spell beyond. When they finished, Victoria insisted on restoring the kitchen to order and shooed them all out of the room. “I shouldn't be long, Mother. If you can wait for me, we can walk back together. I have a few things to get for Aunt Hilda from the general store.”

Pleased that her daughter actually wanted her company, Martha followed Aunt Hilda into the adjoining sitting room. She had not been to the cottage for a spell, and she was surprised to see that the sitting room was in complete disarray. Aunt Hilda had always been such a stickler for keeping her home tidy and clean.

Two faded upholstered chairs, along with several side tables, had been pushed back against the far wall. The knotted rug that usually covered the middle of the floor lay rolled up along
the opposite wall, and the exposed floorboards needed a good sweeping and a strong scrub brush.

“Don't look at all this mess. Victoria and I are in the middle of cleaning,” Aunt Hilda offered. “You and I can have a visit in my bedroom.”

“And I'm off for my constitutional.” Uncle Richard grabbed a sweater and a knit cap off of a peg near the front door and took his leave.

Aunt Hilda's eyes remained focused on the door for a few long moments after he was gone. “He's really a wonderful man,” she murmured before she led Martha into the bedroom the elderly couple shared.

The door to the second bedroom was open, and Martha had a rare glimpse inside. Instead of holding the four little cots she remembered being there years ago, the room held only two now, and she recognized Victoria's robe lying at the foot of one of them. Otherwise, there were two small travel bags, similar in size to the one Martha used to hold her simples, sitting on top of a trunk. She recognized one bag as the one Aunt Hilda had used when she had been called out as an afternurse and assumed the other belonged to Uncle Richard.

The moment she followed Aunt Hilda into her bedroom, Martha dismissed any curiosity she might have had about the contents of the other bedroom. This room was exactly as she remembered.

The heavy winter drapes were tied back, allowing sunlight to pour through a single window. Directly ahead, a large trunk rested on bare floorboards at the foot of a double bed, and a small washstand to her left held a cracked, flowery basin and a pitcher for water.

She focused her attention, however, on the coverlet on the bed. The quilt was a bit faded now and well-worn, but the beauty
of the design and the workmanship required to create the quilt still testified to the unique talent her mother had been given.

“I love this quilt, too,” Aunt Hilda said. She sat down on the bed and patted the space next to her. “Your mother had quite a talent for the needle. I think of her every time I make my bed.”

Martha sat down and traced some of the stitches with her fingertips. “She used to make cradle quilts that Grandmother Poore would give to the new mothers after delivering their babes, too. Unfortunately, I didn't inherit a bit of her talent.”

“Talents are God-given, although we make up our own minds about whether or not we use them,” Aunt Hilda cautioned. “Even though we might be related to someone, that doesn't always mean we share the same talents.”

“I know,” Martha said as more memories brought the past into the present.

Aunt Hilda sighed. “I know how disappointed Sarah was when your mother didn't continue family tradition by becoming a midwife and that you're just as disappointed with your daughter. But you need to remember what a gifted writer Victoria is instead. And remember, too, that God always finds a way to bring us joy, even in the midst of our sorrows and disappointments. In your grandmother's case,” she continued, “that was you, Martha. You brought her such joy by following in her footsteps.”

“Unfortunately, I don't have a granddaughter to do that for me—not that it matters much anymore,” Martha replied, quickly confiding her decision to give up her calling and marry Thomas as soon as she did.

“You'll find someone,” Aunt Hilda insisted and put her arm around Martha's shoulder. “Just keep in mind that God likes to surprise us now and again. You might find a new midwife in the most unlikely of places,” she said. “Speaking of surprises,
I have one of my own to share with you, but you must promise not to say a word about it, not even to Victoria.” Aunt Hilda hugged Martha a little closer. “It seems that my dear darling husband still has a yearning for travel in his soul. He's planning to leave again in a few weeks.”

Caught completely off guard, Martha eased out of her aunt's embrace and turned to search her face. Instead of the grief or sorrow she expected to see etched there, or perhaps a stream of silent tears, Aunt Hilda's countenance radiated sheer joy. Her eyes, however, were oddly mischievous. “You're not upset?”

“Not in the least,” her aunt insisted. “I can't decide if I'm a bit daft or not, but this time I'm going with him.”

Martha gasped. “You're . . . you're leaving?”

Aunt Hilda grinned. “Rather exciting, isn't it?”

“Where are you going?”

A shrug. “Probably west, at least at first. Richard has a few places he wants to show me. After that, we'll discover a few new ones together.”

“Are you absolutely certain you want to give up everything you have here in Trinity? How can you be sure that this is what you want to do?”

Aunt Hilda smiled. “Because I trust that God wouldn't put the desire to leave with my husband in my heart and make it possible for me to go if He had other plans for me.”

Envious of her aunt's faith, Martha took one of her aunt's hands and held on to the last living link she had to her mother and grandmother. “But you're my rock! What will I do without you?”

Aunt Hilda pressed their hands to Martha's heart. “We'll always be together
here
. Always, sweet Martha. But there's only one place I want to be, and that's with Richard. Wherever he goes, for as long as he lives, I want to be with him and share my
life with him. If that's how you feel about Thomas, then stop dawdling and marry that man now, Martha, and make every day you have together really matter.”

With her heart pulsing rapidly against her hands, Martha grew even more determined to find a woman to take over her duties as midwife as quickly as possible. Then she'd do exactly as Aunt Hilda suggested: marry Thomas and make every day they spent as husband and wife even better than the day before.

T
he sun hung high in the sky as Martha and Victoria walked back to the center of town and parted ways.

While Victoria continued on to the general store, Martha walked down the alley alongside the confectionery. She could hear voices inside, although the curtains in the new alcove were drawn and blocked her view.

The white horse lightly tethered to a post near the back door, nuzzling a baking pan that must have been returned and left on the back step, however, garnered all of her attention.

In a matter of heartbeats, she considered the reasons the horse would be there. Even if the confectionery had reopened—which it had not—customers entered by the front door, and so did visitors. Deliveries arrived in the alley by wagon, not a single horse, and customers returning baking pans walked down the alley and left them by the back door. Which meant there was only one reason for the horse being there: another call to duty.

Her heart sank. Unless she was needed somewhere very close
for something easy to resolve, she would have to postpone meeting with Victoria and Dr. McMillan tonight.

Martha hurried her steps, paid little more than passing attention to the horse on her way inside, and rushed down the hallway to the kitchen with a prayer on her lips and hope in her heart that there might be another reason for that horse to be there. Instead of finding someone she knew who had come to summon her away, she found Fern and Ivy standing by the door on the opposite side of the room. There was no one else with them who might have come to summon her away.

“We were just talking about you. How was your visit with Victoria and Hilda?” Ivy asked.

Relieved that she had not been called away, Martha quickly removed her cape and bonnet. “They're all very well,” she replied and hung her cape and bonnet on a wooden peg on the wall. “Did you know there's a horse tied up in the alley, right outside the kitchen door?”

Fern walked over to the cupboard, retrieved a small bit of paper, and handed it to Martha. “Jane found the horse when she left with Cassie to get a few things from the general store. This was tied to the horse's reins, though she had a bit of a time getting it. I hope you don't mind, but Ivy and I were too curious not to read it. Go ahead. Read it quick before I blab out what it says and ruin everything.”

A bit perplexed, Martha wiped her hands on her apron and looked at the note. The paper was badly crinkled, so she straightened it a bit first before she started reading. But the penmanship was so poor, it took her a moment to decipher the words:

Widow Cade, I heard about your horse dyin' so I figured the best reward I could give to settle my debt to you is this mare. Her name is Bella.

Martha read the note twice again before looking up at Ivy, who was beaming. “The horse is for me?”

“That's what the note says. Too bad whoever gave it to you didn't remember to sign the note. Now you won't know for sure who gave it to you, and you can't settle his account in that book of yours.”

For half a heartbeat, Martha wondered if Thomas had gotten the horse for her, but she dismissed the thought because he would have given it to her directly. “Even if I could figure out who did this, a horse of any kind is worth far more than anyone owes me,” Martha said, but her heart swelled with such joy that her chest actually hurt. “The horse is for me!” she gushed as she rushed out of the kitchen and down the hallway, Ivy and Fern following.

Her pulse was racing and her mind was churning with thoughts of how much easier her life was going to be and how much faster she would be able to reach each of the four women she had in mind as her replacement now that she had a horse of her own again. She opened the back door slowly, half afraid she would find the horse gone, but her fears were unfounded.

Bella was still there, and she was as fine a mare as Martha had ever seen. To her surprise, the horse was still licking at that baking pan, and she nearly chuckled at the idea that this horse had a sweet tooth just like she did.

“Good Bella,” she whispered and stepped outside to stand next to the post in front of the horse. Fern and Ivy, however, remained standing side by side in the open doorway. As best as Martha could judge, Bella was only three or four years old. Now that she was really studying the mare, she could see that it was not pure white, but a softer cream color. Her mane and tail were flaxen, but it was the pale, irregular star on her face, just between her eyes, that made her extraordinary in Martha's eyes.

She stroked the mare's face and found brown eyes staring back at her, a bit wary, but definitely interested in the person who was paying such close attention to her. “I don't know you very well right now, Bella, and you don't know me, but I promise to take very, very good care of you. We have a lot to learn about each other, but we're going to have some amazing adventures together,” she whispered and leaned forward to nuzzle the horse's face with her own.

She never got close enough. Without warning, Bella hit her square in the chest with her muzzle. Hard. Jolted back, Martha hit her shoulder on the post and landed square on her bottom on the hard-packed dirt.

She heard Ivy and Fern scream and would have screamed herself, but the air had been knocked right out of her lungs and her brain was too scrambled by the jolt she had taken to have any thought but one when she saw the horse lift a foreleg: Get out of Bella's way.

Acting out of pure instinct, she used the heels of her hands and feet to scramble back, well out of the mare's reach, before she was able to stand again.

Even though her fear that Bella had been about to kick her never materialized, she kept her attention focused on Bella to take stock of the situation, more surprised by the mare's odd behavior than anything else.

Despite the fact that her hands were stinging from scraping against the ground, her back and shoulder ached, and she was still trying to draw measured breaths of air, she had nothing more to complain about than a rather large bruise on her pride.

After reassuring Fern and Ivy that she was fine and sending them back inside, Martha took a few moments to wipe the grit and grime from her hands before she brushed off her skirts. She
made no attempt, however, to go near the horse to retrieve the baking pan, now covered with dirt.

Unfortunately, Thomas chose that precise moment to appear, and Martha took what solace she could from the fact that he had not actually seen her fall so ignominiously.

He took hold of her elbow as if she were not capable of remaining steady on her own two feet. “I was just passing by when I saw the horse knock you off your feet. Are you all right?”

She slipped her arm away and ignored the growing pain in her shoulder. “I'm fine. Just getting acquainted with my new horse, who doesn't appear to be very open to the idea that she now belongs to me.”

He looked back and forth from Martha to Bella and back again twice. “You bought this horse? I thought you said that you—”

“Of course not. If I bought any horse at all, I'd buy a gentle, well-mannered horse like Grace. Unfortunately, someone must have thought that I needed an ill-tempered horse like this one and left her here, along with a note claiming she was my reward,” she quipped before she realized she was talking out of anger and not being fair to the horse. “As I recall, Grace wasn't all that gentle when I first claimed her, though, so I should be able to win Bella over, too.”

He took a few steps closer to study the horse for a moment before he reached out to scratch behind the mare's ears. When he slid his hands down to stroke her face, the horse gently nuzzled at his chest, leaving Martha grumbling under her breath.

Thomas looked over to Martha and shrugged. “Maybe the mare just prefers men, in which case there's probably little you can do to change her mind.” He checked the mare's hindquarters as well as her shoulders with gentle strokes that evoked no response from Bella. “What did you say her name was?”

“It's Bella,” she said, still unable to get past the idea that if Thomas was right, God had answered her prayers with a horse that preferred men. Mercy!

He slipped the reins free from the post. “Do you have any idea who left the horse for you?”

“Unfortunately, whoever left the note forgot to sign it.”

Thomas laughed. “Or didn't sign it because he was more interested in getting rid of Bella and used the fact the he owed you a reward to justify tethering his problem at your doorstep.”

“I don't believe that anyone would do such a thing!”

“Maybe you should,” he argued. “But maybe I'm just judging Bella too rashly. Let's see what she does when you take the reins.”

The moment Martha had the reins in her hand, Bella reared and tried to yank them away, but Thomas grabbed the reins midway up and held them fast so Martha could let go. “Easy, Bella. You can trust Martha. She can be a bit cranky at times, too, but a dessert or two can usually sweeten her mood. Maybe all you need is a bit of a sweet treat, too.”

Martha rolled her eyes but decided not to protest his rather ungallant description of her. “In case you haven't noticed that baking pan lying in the dirt, Bella already had a treat,” she argued, mostly to suggest he was wrong to think the horse preferred men. “I think she's just a bit nervous with me because she doesn't know me yet. Or because she wanted more of a treat than a few crumbs stuck to a baking pan.”

“In that case,” he argued, “I'll hold on to Bella while you slip back inside. There must be some dried apples in the confectionery left from last year's crop. Grab some and let's see what happens when you offer them to her.”

She headed inside and returned with a handful of dried apples. Although she was a bit anxious, she piled the dried apples in the palm of her hand, well away from her fingers. Under
Thomas's watchful gaze, she held her hand out to Bella very slowly, prepared to yank her hand away the minute the horse made any move to bite her.

To her great relief, the mare daintily nibbled at the dried apples and managed to polish them off as if she and Martha were the best of friends. “See? She likes me better now. She's perfectly happy with me.”

“Right now she is, but just a few minutes ago, she tried to yank the reins out of your hand and knocked you off your feet before that,” he reminded her. His expression grew somber and his gray eyes darkened with real concern. “I know you need a horse, and it's awfully tempting to think this horse is the answer to your prayers, but the only thing worse than an ill-tempered horse is an unpredictable one. If you can't truly trust the horse to carry you to and from your calls without any kind of incident, then you have no use for her. Just promise me that if she turns out to be as unpredictable in her behavior as I think she will be, you won't hesitate to come to me. If you can't agree to let me buy you a more reliable horse, you can simply borrow one of mine. Can you at least agree to do that for me? Please?”

Thomas's mood had become so serious, Martha almost asked him why—until she remembered that his wife, Sally, had been killed in a riding accident.

Although Bella appeared to be quite content at the moment, and Martha was confident she could win the horse over eventually, she took his words to heart. “I will,” she said, “but she's a young horse, Thomas. I really think that if I give her a little time to get used to me, she'll turn out to be quite manageable. I just want to give her a chance before I give her up.”

He cocked his head. “How much of a chance?”

“I'll give her a week. Two at the most. After that, if I still can't trust her to behave even a little bit better and it turns out
you're right and she truly does prefer men, then I know exactly what I'm going to do,” she offered and gave him the biggest smile she could muster. “I'm going to give her to you.”

His eyes widened. “Me? Why me? I already have a horse of my own.”

She laughed. “You have several horses, in fact, but if it turns out that Bella can be cranky with anyone, man or woman, there isn't anyone I know who could turn an unpredictable horse like this one into a manageable one better than you could, assuming you put your mind to it.”

He snorted. “And why is that?”

“Because you can be as stubborn in some of your ways as I am,” she retorted. “In the meantime, however, I need to get Bella over to Dr. McMillan's stable. Maybe once she's properly settled into a stall and fed, she'll be a whole lot happier. And along the way, perhaps you can explain how you just happened to be passing by when Bella and I had our first meeting.”

Martha was relieved when Bella offered no objection as she led her down the alley, but Thomas was on the other side of the horse holding on to the bridle strap, prepared to take charge should a problem arise that she could not handle.

“I didn't happen to pass by. I was coming to see you.”

“Any particular reason?” She noted the heavy wagon traffic on Main Street and got ready to hand the reins over to Thomas if Bella balked.

“I know we'll be spending the day together tomorrow, but my daughter asked me to invite you and Victoria to come to supper the following night so you wouldn't make any plans in the meantime that might prevent you from coming. I believe I heard Dr. McMillan's name mentioned as a guest as well. Eleanor said to tell you that if you can come around seven, you could have a visit with my grandson before he gets put to
bed,” he suggested, and the pride in his voice was also etched in his features.

“Thank you. We'd love to come. You can tell Eleanor that we'll be there at seven so I can see her little one,” she replied, then slowed her steps as they approached the corner of the building.

They waited for several wagons to pass before venturing into the roadway, and a docile Bella seemed oblivious to the noise of the heavy traffic and the racket workers were making along the soon-to-be canal. They crossed the covered bridge and entered the stable without incident, and Martha was feeling altogether happy by the time they finished.