Рита Браун - Probable Claws

“And now your brother?”

Charles’s father had died. His older brother, Hugh, inherited the title, along with massive debt since Baron West had denied himself nothing. To his credit he did see his two sons to a good education, then packed off Charles to the Army. Well, the young man had to learn something, and he certainly wasn’t cut out for the church. So like all younger sons in England, Charles found himself socially desirable but impoverished.

“Hugh will try.” He sighed. “He keeps borrowing against the estate. We have no mines, a source of wealth. All we have is land, and father proved a poor manager. He always overrode the true manager. So my brother struggles. He is not profligate but one does incur heavy responsibilities in his position. I am grateful to God that I was captured at Saratoga, sent down here. The long march from Saratoga to Virginia opened my eyes to the future. Someday, my love, you will see the country of my birth. It is beautiful and yet, here, here I can do and be as I wish.” He beamed at her. “And I met you. There aren’t women like you in England, sweetheart. One marries according to one’s station. Love has little to do with it, although over the years a couple can learn to care for each other.”

“No love matches at all?”

“A few, but in the main, no. One must raise troops for the king if so commanded. One must attend at court, especially if one wishes a political career. I did not, but there are times when one must go for the good of the family. And the social season. Endless balls, empty chatter, a fortune spent on clothes, men as well as women. A good wife advances her husband, the family. Here I can come and go as I please, and I can use my mind. I’ve found work I love, a woman I love. I have two beautiful and noisy daughters. I have Piglet.” He looked down at his faithful corgi, who survived war and capture with him. “But someday, when the girls are older, I would like them to know their father’s land.” He stopped a moment, grinned. “And I would like some of my old chums to see the woman I married.”

“You’ll have to teach me how to address people. I know that’s very important over there.”

“I will.”

Karl called down from the pulpit. “We can’t paint and we can’t gild. Too cold. I had hoped for an early spring, as did the Missus.”

“Karl, if there’s one thing Virginia has taught both of us, it is that the weather is variable.”

Karl had been in the prisoner-of-war camp at the Barracks with Charles. Although Karl was a Hessian they struck up a friendship, as did Charles with John Schuyler, his captor. Fate. Charles believed in fate.

“Indeed.” He dusted off the pulpit with a chamois cloth. “Well, we will be down there looking up, but at whom, I know not.”

“Oh, the pastor will appear.” Charles smiled. “In good time.”

“Aye.”

Charles looked out the windows again. “Karl, might as well stop. Looks ominous.”

Karl followed Charles’s gaze. “Does. Miles for us to get home.”

“Let’s hope we make it before the heavens open.”

Cloverfields, seven miles from Wayland’s Corner where St. Luke’s was being built, was at least on a decent road. Mostly it was straight with a curve or two. It wasn’t until one drove or rode just east of Cloverfields that the road twisted, dipped, dropped over Ivy Creek, and became churned mud or slick ice quickly, too quickly.

They made it. Karl worked and lived at Cloverfields. Ewing, like others, used the prisoners for temporary workers during the war. Highly skilled, the only impediment proved to be language. In time that ironed out.

Charles drove Rachel to their door then turned, driving Castor and Pollux, two large horses, to their stable.

Tulli dashed out. “Mr. Charles. Gonna be hateful mean.” He pointed to the sky.

“Well it is. I’ll help you unhitch and wipe down so you can go home before the worst.”

Jeddie walked into the draft horse stable. “I’ll do that, Sir. You go on home. If it gets too bad we can bunk up here or maybe make it down to my cabin.”

“How do you like living alone?”

“I like it fine. People keep giving me things. Bumbee gives me blankets and Barker O. brought me a chair. And I have my own bed.”

“Can you keep it warm?”

“I stoke the fire before I go to sleep and the first thing I do in the morning is stoke it again.”

“Good, and I’m glad you can keep warm. Thank you, Tulli. You, too, Jeddie.”

It would never occur to Charles not to thank the two boys, well, Jeddie was a young man. He hated it as a child when he’d watch the monied people treat those beneath them, and they literally were beneath them, rudely. Charles, like his father in this regard, thought human society a pyramid. No matter where one is in that pyramid, everyone needs one another.

He walked into his home, Piglet at his heels.

“Tea?”

“Oh, what a wonderful idea.”

Just as he said that a fist of wind hit the side of the house, shaking it.

Rachel joined him. No sooner had they sat down when John burst through the door.

Charles stood up, seeing his friend in distress, for he knew John well. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know. Come quickly.”

Within minutes they were in John and Catherine’s house. Father Gabe and Bettina were there along with Ruth, good with all children and with the gift of healing.

Rachel walked into her sister’s bedroom. The men hovered at the door.

Catherine smiled at Rachel. “I’m such a bother.”

“What’s wrong?”

Bettina, on the other side of the bed, held Catherine’s hand. “She started bleeding.”

Ruth brought a pan of warm water. Shooed the men out except for Father Gabe.

“I can get up.”

“No,” Bettina forcefully commanded.

As Father Gabe gently lifted her up, the two women washed her. Towels rested under her on the bed. Rachel removed them, hurried down the hall for more.

When she returned, Father Gabe lifted Catherine again. Rachel placed clean towels underneath her.

“The bleeding slowed.” Ruth squeezed out a wet rag, placing it on Catherine’s head.

“I’ll be fine,” Catherine said weakly.

“Of course you will, but you do as Bettina and Father Gabe and Ruth tell you. And me, too.” She smiled and Catherine smiled back.

“Listening to them will be easier than listening to you.”

“Are you in pain?”

“No. I was climbing down the stairs and I felt the sharpest pain I have ever felt in my life. Then blood gushed out of me. I could barely reach the top of the stairs. I called for John. I could see from his face…well, anyway, he carried me in here, ran for Father Gabe then ran for you. Father Gabe brought Bettina and Ruth. That’s all I remember.”

“Did you pass out?”

“I don’t remember.” Catherine closed her eyes, then opened them. “I don’t hurt at all now.”

John and Charles tiptoed into the room.

Catherine turned to face her husband. “Come by me, John.”

He did. “I should fetch a doctor. The new fellow. The one who put Jeffrey and Yancy back together. He’ll know what to do.”

“The weather isn’t good. Wait until it clears.”

Rachel looked to Father Gabe, then the two women.

Bettina spoke up. “Fever. We got to watch for fever.”

“I don’t feel hot.”

“No, but it might come on,” Bettina wisely said.

“Let me sleep. Go tomorrow.” She fought to stay awake.

Catherine, always healthy and strong, had never felt pain like what seized her on the steps. Weakness and drowsiness overtook her.

Bettina sat with her, as did Rachel, as she fell into a deep sleep. Under the circumstances, the sleep was a blessing.