Jan Karon - In the Company of Others

A keeps a kettle on the Surgery hob & brews me a strong cup each afternoon. Should I demur, she tells me Missus wishes it, & thus I drink it to please them both. I found myself staring today at the top of A’s head as she stooped to pick something off the floor. I saw where the hair parted from forehead to crown, a path through a dark wood, her pink scalp a living world unto itself.

My Lord & my God, have mercy upon me.

Mid-October 1862

This week past we saw near eighty patients in the Surgery & twenty-four on rounds. I asked for A’s assistance throughout the week, thereby robbing C of her most valuable helper. A is like a daughter, says C who could not conceive in our many years of effort. I note here that A is a fine nurse by nature-I believe this may be her Gift from On High.

We must have more hands about Cathair Mohr & have hired on Jessie, a round lass of nineteen who throws back her head & laughs like any sailor. Tis rumored she is unafraid of work & proficient at scrubboard & iron. She will share A’s small room back of the Scullery.

I was looking two days past for Uncle’s early English fruit spoons in a repoussé pattern that is very handsome. As we were to have fruit compote that evening, I took C’s key ring & unlocked the sideboard & found the worn Velveteen box with its small clasp. I opened it & saw the spoons were missing. As C is the only one with access to the board’s key, or any key, I assumed she had the spoons in service somewhere but she said she did not.

There are certain things one grasps without head knowledge-tis the gut speaking.

I waited until Keegan was well away from the house & Fiona up to her elbows in dough. If I had seen their room crowded before, it was now so furbished with clutter & disarray that naught but a path, more a tunnel, was open through it.

The stink of the chamber pot was rife. I stepped to the dresser without hesitation, as if led there by instinct & opened the top drawer & there lay the spoons among a scramble of disheveled linens. Though I had gone looking, I was startled by the discovery, could not believe my eyes. My heart pounded like that of any thief. I slipped the spoons into my pocket & took them to C who was rightfully alarmed.

Put them back into the box, I said & let us see how things go. No, she said, let us use them as planned, in plain view. When Fiona served the table, I studied her carefully, not attempting to hide my gaze. I had set the spoons on the board where the compote would be placed. I saw or believed I saw the slightest flinching in her right shoulder as she spied them but when she turned again to the table there was nothing writ on her broad face but nonchalance.

C & I too harried to treat this pestering sore; we are managing to close our eyes to it, believing F would not have the gall to do it again, being so found out. C & A will be making a full inventory of all plate & dinner ware, even to the pots & pans & C will keep the keys with her at all times.

I have of course said nothing to Keegan & do not believe he is implicated-we will bide our time as F is after all a grand cook though slovenly in the kitchen. Further, I find the proximity of their room-to where I now sit to write-a Grievance. Why do I so often act without thinking? There stands the cottage with its greater comforts but The Bride of All the World wishes to be in the big house & with the servants’ quarters on the top floor yet unfinished, twas the only room available to satisfy her whim.

I find the master and mistress more often pressed to satisfy the caprice of servants than the other way round.

17 October 1862

We learned yesterday why Jessie is so rotund. She is pregnant into the fifth month.

After a morning of loud weeping and hand-wringing with C, all was again calm. If she had told us, she said, we would not have taken her on. She has no home to go to as her people have disowned her and the child’s father has run away to Antrim.

Ruse & subterfuge appear to be the ticket these days at Cathair Mohr, but as much to the point-when she came into the surgery seeking work, why did I not perceive that she was carrying a child? And how did C miss this?

I thought she was overly fond of the table, says C.

That alone should have been a warning, I say.

As to what we shall do in this predicament, C and I merely exchange a look-that is all we have time or energy to offer the other.

Keegan recommends a cousin as the man for overseeing the demesne. But taking his wife into account, I have had enough of Keegan’s staffing the place and will go down to my Solicitor who knows town puffs & able countrymen alike.

I took Balfour’s daughter a sweet when I called up with my Onion. You must thank the doctor, says Lady Balfour to the girl who is slow-witted as any tot. Balfour stands nearby, looking dour.

We’ve thanked the doctor well enough and bloody more, says Lady B’s grinding little consort. He’s built his pile upon the thanks we’ve given him. Balfour laughs, then, revealing teeth the color of sheep dung.

I hardly remember laughter of my own in recent times-yet this morning was able to enjoy the Medicine of mirth such as I had not done in years.

A reported to the Surgery at seven-thirty wearing a cap she had made. That she has never in her life seen a nurses cap is evident. Her version, albeit white, features a starched central peak banded at the base with bits of yellowing lace.

She goes about her work soberly, lighting the fire she laid last evening, putting the fresh linen on the table, pulling the little step stool out for the patient to clamber up.

Three anxious souls wait beyond the door.

And who is there for us this mornin’, sir?’ says A, bright as any penny.

Edema, Goiter, & Dyspepsia, say I.

Her laughter is generous & unaffected.

That would be Missus O’Bierne, Missus Teague an’ Danny Moore’s grandda, she says in her careful English.

Tis pride I am feeling for Aoife O’Leary’s quick wit.

Before Edema comes in, however, I know I must say something about the cap-it is in the room with us like a whale & no one speaking of it.

Your cap! I say.

Twill make my work in the Surgery more… proper, she says, coloring.

She sees I am tentative. I see she is deciding between disappointment & saving face. At once she removes the cap & goes to the far table & pops it on the human skull I keep-tis a wonder to most patients, a fright to others.

The cap is a perfect foil for the vacant eyes and ancient teeth. I start laughing & cannot stop. Tears are soon running down-the Foolishness of my laughter cannot be restrained, it is contagious as any pox for A is also laughing unhindered. I then hear the answering guffaw of Pat Moore beyond the door whereupon I open the door & stick my head out & both women erupt into laughter at the sight of their country physician looking the lunatic.

Something is going out of me-I am a pustule draining poisonous matter. It is the sort of release for which one would pay money.

Laughing yet, I step out & take Missus O’Bierne’s crusty ould hand & lead her into the Surgery & there is C, standing white & still at the door from the hall.

At the look of her, we fall instantly silent & she turns & goes-we hear her footsteps along the flagstones.

I do not know the date

Time it is a- flying, as the poet says

I can confess this nowhere but here. Upon standing in the yard this morning & seeing Fiona wring the necks of three hens, I felt vilely ill & faint. And then came the axe & the blood. I who have seen rivers of blood could not bear the sight.

My days of training & practice in Philadelphia seem as far from me as the planets from Earth. After arriving Pa. in 1828, there came the cholera epidemic four years later, with 900 dead.