I'd have to feed old Teddy first thing. But it took me a time just getting the snow cleared from the door to get into the barn. Our dog, Whiskers, jumped out at me with his happy tail bouncing. Dorcas the cat, with a kitten now as big as she was, came rubbing at my ankles. I expected they'd all spent the night snuggled together in the hay.
Teddy appeared to be asleep, standing up in the stall where we'd put him last night. I pulled the end of a bale of hay and threw it in at his feet. Lula Bell was calling me, ready for the milking to be over and done. I patted her soft neck and pulled up the stool. I'd never milked a cow before her, nor even touched one, but she and I had come to a pretty decent understanding in the seven months we'd been here.
I could hear Robert and at least one of the Hammond boys hollering back and forth in the general direction of the chicken coop. No doubt the better part of them would want to play a while in the snow, if they had decent clothes for it, which most of them didn't. It set me to wondering about the walk to school after New Year's. I'd still send my two, even in the cold, or probably walk them there myself. But maybe the Hammonds would be missing a lot of days through the worst of the winter. They seemed to miss a lot of days anyway. Especially the older ones, who hardly ever went.
And then I thought of Christmas. Only five days away. I'd made sleds for my kids, since buying anything was out of the question. But what about the Hammonds? Had George found a way to provide anything other than Patches the pig for their Christmas? He had more livestock than we did, but that was about all. I'd worked a part of the harvest for Barrett Post, and that helped us buy groceries at least, but I wasn't sure if George had gotten much cash for anything, even what little he'd managed to pull out of his and Emma's dry field. I thought maybe we ought to have them all over. With Wilametta being sick like this, they might appreciate somebody else doing a little Christmas for them. Juli could probably even turn out a cake good enough to suit Rorey if she had to.
I was almost done milking, with the cat rolling around my ankles, when Joe came out to the barn looking for me.
“Snowing,” he said. “Starting to come down pretty good again.”
I shook my head. That was about the opposite of what I'd expected and wanted right now.
“Was thinking maybe I oughta go over and see if Pa could use a hand with chores.”
He was worrying, I could see it in him. But here was another thin Hammond boy in barely adequate clothing, about to head out through the drifts. “Better get something in your belly first,” I told him. “It'll take a lot longer than usual getting through that timber today.”
Robert suddenly showed up in the doorway behind him. “You gonna cook breakfast for all of us?”
“I guess I will. Unless you want to.”
“There wasn't but four eggs. They's way down.”
“It's the cold. Don't worry about it. I'll make pancakes. Get Whiskers that other bone your mother boiled for the soup yesterday.”
Robert was quiet a minute, thinking. “You s'pose she'll be able to get home today with all this snow?”
“Remains to be seen, buddy.” I picked up the milk pail, not near full, and started for the house with Joe and Robert following me. It was snowing harder, all right. Willy was sitting in the middle of a snowdrift, and Joe scolded him soundly with the reminder that they had no dry clothes to change into. And I thought of Juli, only a mile away.
But what a mile it was on a day like this.
FIVE
Julia
It was getting light, but not near light enough to lift my soul that morning. No more firewood in the house. Water bucket empty. Not a sign from George or anyone else through the many long, cold hours. I sat on the floor where I'd sunk last night, but there were no more tears, and I could barely put two thoughts together. I just sat staring at the grimy kitchen walls, the peeling paint and once-rosy paper border now curling downward from the tattered corners. Everywhere was loss. And decay. Everywhere I looked.
It occurred to me that I didn't have to stay here, that I could try to push my way through the woods to my family, snow or no snow. I was sturdy enough. I'd walked it several times in fine weather and always enjoyed myself. But Emma was here. Here.
She might've been in Belle Rive just a skip away from the doctor if she hadn't loved her farm so much. She'd come to live her last days and die at home and be buried next to her beloved Willard. But this was a cruel, ugly trick. Just a mile away. Just a mile. But she died here.
The thought gave me a deep, seething anger that scared me. I felt like throwing things at the faceless sky. I might have done it and felt justified too, if there'd been much of anything handy that was mine to throw.
It was plain unfair, and anyone could see it. Emma was good. The best person I'd ever known. She'd given her whole heart to people, and everything else she could think of to give, even though she never had much for herself. Emma was a saint if I ever met one. How could it possibly have hurt the plan of heaven to allow her to die where she wanted to die, right in her own bed, in her own house, on the farm that had been her life for more than seventy years?
I rose up off the floor, a darkness clouding over me like I'd never known before, a deep, searing hurt that soaked through me like oil. “She prayed to you, God,” I said aloud, startled at the raspiness of my voice. “Why would you let this happen?”
My hands were like ice, and it was no help at all trying to rub a little warmth into my stiff arms.
It's so cold,
I thought.
At least there won't be much change to the bodies by the time someone finds us. Maybe I'll be dead by then too.
I thought of George, still out there somewhere. He was the one who might be dead, and truly. Maybe I should've looked for him. Maybe I should've run over to Samuel, or somewhere, last night, trying to get help. Maybe there was something I could've done to save somebody. But now there were children to face. Children.
Oh, God, why?
I pulled on my coat, not knowing why I hadn't thought of that before. I'd been sitting half froze, with blankets and my coat just a few feet away. And there was wood outside, surely. George would have a stock of it somewhere. The barn, maybe.
Through the window I saw that it was snowing, and I wanted to curse. I didn't do it, but having the feeling shook me. I used to think I was strong. Even after losing our home in Pennsylvania and all we had, I'd managed to be all right. I'd felt God's protective hand. But this was different. Wilametta's was a senseless, premature death. Like my mother, so long ago. But Wila had left ten needy souls behind her, not just one. It brought tears to my eyes again, thinking especially of Rorey, who was about the size I was when I'd heard the news of my own mother. And then there was Emma. An angel on earth. If this could happen to her, then anything could happen. Lord have mercy.
I couldn't leave till someone came. I couldn't leave Emma here, even in death. But I knew I should look for George. Emma would want me to. I had daylight now if I had nothing else, and I could get to the barn at least, just to see if he might've gone there. At least I'd know that much.
But it was a terrifying thought, knowing there might be another body to face. Or he might just be gone, never to be found. What would I tell his children then? Might they look at me forever as the one who'd been here, the one who might've done something to make a difference but didn't? I couldn't think of anything I could've done differently, and yet I'd failed. Utterly and desperately.
I buttoned my coat, forgetting the hat and scarf that lay at the top of my bag. I'd never taken off the boots, the only pair Emma had kept two of. She'd said they were so nice they ought to be shared. I turned and looked at the door that separated me from the sight of her and Wila. I thought of them here, just this summer, enjoying sassafras together while Emma looked over Emma Grace with a smile. So much they'd shared. And they were still sharing, even now.
With the deepest breath I could muster out of lungs that felt like lead, I turned and shoved the outer door open. It wasn't as windy as it had been, but it was cold, and the snow was heavy again, piling on top of all that was already there. Barren, frigid wasteland as far as the eye could see. Quiet as the death that encompassed it. It seemed as if a spell had been cast over this place that had always before been boisterous enough to make a body tired.
My legs were like jelly. Pushing them through the drifts of snow was a torture. But the barn stood only a stone's throw before me, pale as the sky. I started shaking inside as I neared it.
“Mr. Hammond?”
I might as well have been talking to the wind. My voice just spilled out over the snow-flaked sky and went on endless without response.
“Mr. Hammond!”
Lord, have mercy. Lord, send Samuel to me. It's too late for the doctor. Oh, dear God, please send Samuel.
The barn door was open just a crack, and snow was blowing in. I had to squeeze myself through the opening because it was froze in place and there was no budging it. With some relief I heard the shuffle of animal hooves. I'd almost expected to find the place ghostly empty or filled with the dead, frozen bodies of George Hammond's forsaken stock.
I edged over the straw-strewn floor, looking in on three pigs in one stall and a big billy goat in another.
“Mr. Hammond?”
There was firewood along one wall, standing nearly as high as my head. More pigs were grunting from somewhere nearby, and I could smell them now too. That was the only thing that seemed familiar here. The only thing that hadn't changed.
The pigs started in squealing, and I figured that seeing me brought them the hope of breakfast. But I didn't know where the feed was, and I had other things pressing on me. Slowly I peeked in every stall, steeling myself the best I could for whatever I might find.
A sleek, gray barn cat peered up at me from a hole in the floor, a mutilated mouse dangling precariously from her jaws. Somewhere a cow was calling, and then another, and then the first one again. I sought them out, following the sound to the south end of the barn, where I could finally see old Rosey with her head down to the hay. There were at least half a dozen goats in with her, and a younger cow. This was the largest enclosure of the barn, and only a wire fence and a crooked unlatched gate separated me from the animals.
I put the hook in place when the goats started crowding toward the fence, pushing their noses at me, hoping for a treat. There was a stack of hay in one corner, but they ignored it to gather around me, all but Rosey and one little nanny goat that stood busily licking away at something I couldn't quite see. I almost turned away, but the nanny raised her head, and I could see then what she found so interesting. A boot. An old, brown, man's boot, well worn and patched.
George Hammond's. Sure as I was standing. Fear clutched at my throat so tight I could hardly breathe. I couldn't see but the bottom and one side of the boot sticking out from the edge of the hay. If he was in it, he was lying still.
I forced the gate open and pushed my way through the goats. The beasts kept on crowding me, getting in my way, and I shoved at them and hit one right between the ears, my eyes blurring and my breath coming in short, hard gasps. I couldn't call out to him now. I was too afraid, even at this distance, that there'd be no answer.
George was in the boot. Backed up in the hay with Rosey standing over him like a protective mother, a pair of goats cuddled at his chest and the nanny now nudging at his knees. He was blue with cold. I was afraid to touch him and couldn't help thinking of Joe, how he'd looked running to our house just yesterday, scared and urgent. I hadn't had the sense then to be worried for him. I hadn't had the faintest inkling.
Then George moved, just the slightest bit. Rosey leaned her nose down to him, but I pushed at her and fell down on my knees at his side. He opened his eyes and looked at me, but it wasn't him, really. Not the same as he'd been. He looked empty.
“Mr. Hammond, can you get up?”
He closed his eyes and turned his face away from me.
“Mr. Hammond! You have to get up! You have to come in the house!”
“No.” He shook his head. “I can't.”
“You have to!” I screamed, all of my anger pouring out at him. I grabbed at his icy arm and gave him a mighty pull. “You have to! You're gonna die if you don't! And one of your sons is gonna find you laying here and wonder why you wouldn't even try!”
He opened his eyes, and for a minute I thought he was going to come to himself. But he shook his head again, his voice now as cold and horrible as his touch. “Get away from me.” He shoved me back against Rosey's leg, and she stepped away from us. The goats were crowding in again, and he let them. I pushed them back.
“Mr. Hammond, you got ten kids to think about! You're cold as ice. You got to get to the house. You got to.”
I tried to grasp his arm again, but he pulled it away from me. “I can't go in there. Don't you unnerstand? I can't.”
I stood. One goat came nibbling at my skirt, and the nanny commenced to licking at George's boot again. He curled his legs up to him, shivering. I could see that it wasn't his right mind, this thing that had hold on him. It wasn't his right mind to stay out here in the hay with the goats and the cows, despairing of life.
“Wilametta didn't ask to leave you this way,” I told him. “She wouldn't want you just giving up.”
“Get away from me.”
He looked hard, vicious, and I knew he'd shove me again if I tried to touch him. There was nothing I could do to make him get up. I couldn't wrestle a man bigger than me and carry him in the house. I couldn't convince him, not with my rational talk. He was half crazed or more, whether from the grief or the cold or both, and not even looking on me as a friend.