Julia Spencer-Fleming - Out Of The Deep I Cry

Friday, March 14, 1924

Mary fell sick around midnight. Jane was asleep, but wakened to the baby’s faint whimpering sound as if a gunshot had gone off in her ear. She sat up, disoriented for a moment by the darkness and the lack of Jon in the bed. No, that was all right. He was sitting up with Jack. So she could sleep. She paused, halfway down to the bed again, but the sound came again. Not Mary’s usual squawk-then-resettle. Jane swung out of bed and padded to the nursery.

Pale. Feverish. Dusky blue. Jane clamped her teeth together to keep from crying out. She lifted the baby from her crib and settled her on her shoulder. Mary’s breath rasped and rattled in her ear all the way downstairs.

Jon was sitting in one of the parlor chairs, Jack asleep on his chest. A lantern burned beside them, casting shadows over the cups and liniment bottles and rags littering the table. “What are you-” He broke off when he saw Mary.

“The baby’s got it.” Jane crouched down next to the chair. “We have to do something.”

“What?” Jon’s voice was as hoarse and choked as Peter’s. “Tell me what to do and I’ll do it. Tell me how to get past those men without getting a gunshot to the back. Tell me.”

She drew another chair near and picked up the glass of salt and goldenseal gargle she had prepared earlier. She poured some one-handed into a child’s cup and, seating Mary on her lap, forced some of the liquid into her mouth. The baby spluttered and gagged. Jane clamped a rag over her mouth and let her cough it out. Then she looked at Jon.

“You’ll have to go through the woods.”

“They’ll hear me if I take one of the horses out of the barn.”

“On foot. Go through the woods on foot until you reach the telegraph line. You can follow that down to town.”

“That’ll take all night!”

“And you could have Dr. Stillman here by the morning. Once he’s here, there won’t be anything they can do about it.”

“What if they try to hurt the doctor? What if they try to hurt you or the children after he’s gone?”

“They’re not going to show themselves to the doctor. And… and…” She cast about for a way to ensure the bootleggers wouldn’t hurt them out of spite.

“I could collect some of the neighbors on my way back. Have ’em show up here with their guns.”

“Good Lord, no. That’s all we need. A shoot-out in our barnyard. No, you stay in town after you fetch the doctor. I’ll tell them that you’re returning after they leave, and if we aren’t all okay, you’re going to the police with their names and descriptions and license plate numbers and what all.”

“I don’t like it.”

“I don’t care.” Her voice cracked on the last word. “Look at them.” She brushed Mary’s fine blond hair away from her forehead. The two-year-old’s chest heaved as the air whistled in and out of her throat. Jack was asleep, barely breathing, deep plum-colored circles beneath his eyes and every freckle standing out against his pale cheeks like ink scattered across a page.

“Okay. I’ll go.” Jon stood, settling their son against a pillow in the chair and drawing the quilt back over him.

“Change into something dark. And warm.”

He nodded and disappeared upstairs. Mary on her shoulder, she went into the kitchen and threw a few splits of wood into the stove. She pumped water into the kettle and set it on to boil. Jon returned, wearing his green twill pants and brown barn coat. “How’s this?”

“Good,” she said. “Don’t forget your hat and gloves.”

He looked as if he wanted to smile for her, but couldn’t. Instead, he wrapped her and the baby in a bear hug. “I love you,” he said.

“I love you, too. Be careful.”

Then he was gone. Hushing the baby, she circled around the stairs and went into the darkened dining room. Through its window, she could just make out Jon’s outline as he crossed beneath her wash line, heading for the fields. She wanted to plaster herself to the glass and watch him until he was safe out of sight, but she made herself turn and retrace her steps back to the kitchen. Normal. In control. She had children to look after.

She peeped in on the olders. She was worried about Lucy, as well, who had slept almost all of the day and had no appetite when awake. In the light from the kitchen, she could see where heavy, rust-tinged phlegm had run from her daughter’s nose and mouth to stain the pillowcase. Oh, Lord, that doesn’t look good. She was on her way to get a rag to clean it up when she heard the shot.

Oh sweet Jesus no . Her body urged her to race out the door and find her husband. Her body told her to flee to the back bedroom and hide in the dark. Caught between impossible demands, she trembled, frozen, in the hallway. There was no other noise. There were no more shots. And then she heard it, the sound of footsteps and a man’s complaining, and, thank God, thank God, Jon’s voice, demanding to be let go.

The door burst open and the fancy suit came in, followed by two men she hadn’t seen before, controlling Jon with his arm twisted up to the middle of his back.

She clutched Mary to her. Her nightgown covered her more than many dresses, but it was still her nightgown, and no man other than her father and husband had ever seen her in one. She jerked her chin up. “Let my husband go.”

The man in the fancy suit laughed. “You got a spunky one there, mister. You ever have to wallop her one to make her mind?” He gestured toward the kitchen. “Take him in there.”

Jane scurried ahead of them. She shut the bedroom door and backed against it.

“What’s in there?” one of the men asked. He had a droopy mustache that could have belonged to a dime-novel cowboy.

“Two sick children,” she said. She was amazed her voice didn’t shake. “Who need to see the doctor.”

The fancy suit indicated his men should sit Jon at the table. They released his arm, and he rubbed his wrist, watching them all the while with wide, white-rimmed eyes.

“That’s what I mean. We’ve already been through this, but you didn’t listen. You’ve got kids. What do you do if they don’t listen to you?” He stared at her. “You wallop ’em.”

She hugged Mary so tightly the baby started to cry, a thin, mewling version of her usual full-lunged bawl. “Don’t you touch my children,” Jane said. “Don’t you dare touch them.”

The young man touched his chest. “What kind of a person do you think I am? I don’t hurt kids.” He nodded to the man with the droopy mustache, who grabbed Jon’s wrist and prized his hand flat. The fancy-suited man pulled a gun from beneath his jacket. Jane opened her mouth to plead, to shriek, when he reversed the gun in his hand and smashed the butt end against Jon’s index finger.

Jon screamed. The third man leaned against his shoulders, forcing him into the chair, while the droopy mustache pushed his hand open. Jane saw the young man’s arm rise, the carbon gleam of the gun’s handle, like a ball-peen hammer, and then he smashed it down again, shattering Jon’s middle finger.

Her husband screamed and wept and howled. Mary wailed breathlessly, and from behind the bedroom door, Jane heard Lucy cry out and Peter stumble from his bed. The man in the fancy suit looked at her, eyebrows raised. “Well? Go settle ’em down.”

She sidled through the door, closing it behind her. “Shh. Sssh.”

“Mama, I can’t see!”

“Get back into bed, Peter.”

Lucy’s voice was weak and clogged with phlegm. “Mama?”

“Daddy’s had an accident. He hurt his hand, but he’ll be all right. He didn’t mean to wake you up. Everything’s fine. Go back to sleep now.” She stepped through the door and latched it behind her.