A Buss from Lafayette (18 page)

The doctor turned, carefully set his glass down on the counter, and picked up the black medical bag that he had set there. When I was a little girl, I had thought that such bags carried by doctors had babies inside them. After all, I had reasoned, when they said they were going to “deliver” babies, they always brought their bags along. I no longer believed this was what
actually happened, but I was not quite sure what did. In any case, I was happy to see that the doctor had his bag along, so there would be no delay, whether there was a baby inside or not.

“Mr. Towne,” Dr. Flagg rasped, “I hope you will keep that rum safe for me until I take care of this girl’s stepmother.” He looked at me and gave a nearly imperceptible sniff. “Well, missie, do not waste my time. Let us be off!”

I trailed him out the door and watched him climb into a rickety gig that looked as if it had seen better days—and many of them indeed. “On Gould Hill, correct?” he asked.

“Aye, sir.”

“You had best get on your horse and lead the way. That will get us there the fastest.”

I untied Flame, and then remembered there was no mounting block at Towne’s. I hesitated, then looked down and recalled that I was wearing breeches under my dress. I pulled up my skirt and petticoat and tucked them into my sash. Then, putting my hands on top of Flame’s back, I vaulted up and landed astride, something I had done many times with the docile Feather.

This horse was
not
the docile Feather.

As soon as I landed on her back, the startled filly
reared up on her two back legs. I instinctively locked my knees to Flame’s sides—something impossible to do on a sidesaddle—grabbed two handfuls of the horse’s mane, and held on with all the strength in my legs and arms.

Luckily, when Flame’s front hooves finally came down to earth again, the horse seemed to have gotten over her surprise at my precipitous action and stood quietly, although she was quivering all over.

At that moment, to my amazement, I heard a hoarse “Bravo, my girl!” from Dr. Flagg.

I let go of Flame’s mane, took up the reins, and guided the horse across Main Street. It was only then that I became truly aware of the massive crowd of people standing at Wiggins Tavern, every one of them staring at me.
Oh, well
, I thought.
The damage to my reputation is done, but it is for a good cause.

In the crowd, I glimpsed Miss Eaton, the village schoolmistress, surrounded by her pupils. Next to her stood Elder Putney and his wife, which explained why they had not been at the Putney Tavern when I had stopped there on the way to the village. Seeing everyone’s eyes on me, I suddenly realized that, added to all my other unladylike behavior, I was in the village with no shoes on my feet or bonnet on my head!

I gave a quick, apologetic wave in the general
direction of Wiggins Tavern as I urged Flame into a canter. Turning left in front of First Church, I raced up Hopkinton Road, with Dr. Flagg’s gig close behind me.

Soon we reached my house. I swiftly dismounted and pulled my skirts down before rushing inside, Dr. Flagg at my heels.

From the kitchen, we could hear my stepmother talking loudly to herself in the back room, her words punctuated by pain. “Why on earth did I let my little sister talk me—uh!—into this? But oh, no, I never could say no to Caroline. And she was dying. Made me promise to marry Samuel and be a mother to her children. To help Clara—uh!—get an education. So I promised! And look what it got me? And I have already failed as a mother—uh!—I know I have.”

My stepmother’s words caused me to stop so suddenly that Dr. Flagg ran into me. Could this be true?

“Pay no attention to what she says, girl,” Dr. Flagg muttered to me. “Women talk nonsense when they are birthing babies.”

When we got to her bedside, I spoke to my stepmother in a tone as soothing as I could make it. “We are here, ma’am. Dr. Lerned is delivering someone else’s baby out at Rattlesnake Hill today, but Dr. Flagg is with me. Everything will be all right.”

She gave me a brief, worried look.

Dr. Flagg set down his medical bag, took off his jacket, and went to the pitcher of water and basin on the stand next to the bed in a reassuringly businesslike way. “Now, ma’am, as soon as I wash my hands, we will see this little person into the world without delay.” He nodded at his patient as he scrubbed his hands.

With obvious effort, my stepmother looked at the doctor calmly. “I thank you for attending me, sir,” she said weakly. She then reached out and took my hand.

“Please, Clara,” she said. “You must go and tell your father that the baby is coming. Samuel is certainly on his way back from Warner by now, but he might be taking his time. Please find him and tell him I want him home with me.”

“Do you not need me to stay and help?” I asked Dr. Flagg.

He shook his head briskly. “No, I can take care of things here. If that is what she wants, you had better go, girl.”

As I made my way out of the house, I could hear Dr. Flagg telling my stepmother all about the dramatic scene in the village, when Flame had reared up and I had managed to stick to her back. “She clung to that wild horse just like she was glued on, ma’am! What an intrepid young stepdaughter you have!”

I hope he does not tell her how her intrepid young
stepdaughter had been wearing breeches and had her skirts tucked up around her waist at the time,
I thought.
Not to mention that she was both bareheaded and barefooted!

I quickly re-tucked my skirts into my sash, led Flame back to the mounting block, and climbed up on her now quite sweaty back once again.

It suddenly occurred to me that Flame was in a “state of inelegance”.
I guess female horses can glow, too,
I thought, as we hastened out of the barnyard in search of Father.

C
HAPTER 32

Soon I was cantering down Hopkinton Road to the north, towards what was called the “upper village” of the town, Contoocookville. Once there, I wondered why so many people were standing by the side of the road and where they could all have come from. Usually not many people were seen in this village. A number of water-powered mills—to grind grain into flour and saw wood into planks and such—lined the Contoocook River, but only a few houses were in the village.

I think all the mills have ground to a halt,
I thought, nervously noting that even in my state of high anxiety, playful words kept popping up in my head.

All the millers and their customers appeared to be standing in the street near the covered bridge across the river. Indeed, it appeared that the whole countryside had been emptied of people, judging from the size of the crowd that was buzzing with excitement. It appeared to be a very
mixed
crowd, as well. The millers, their smocks dusted over with white flour that gave them a ghostly appearance, stood next to elderly men
wearing uniforms like that of the stranded stranger I had met at Towne’s store. Sunburned farmers, both men and boys, clustered together talking and glancing back up the road where I had just come from. Women and girls clad in their Sunday best held bouquets of flowers, and barefooted children ran around madly chasing each other.

I briefly wondered what could be going on, but was too intent on finding Father to give the puzzle more than a passing thought.

I rode on through the upper village and kept going for several miles beyond it, well past Brown’s Brook. I was nearly at the town line between Hopkinton and Warner, where I could see another crowd had gathered, before I spotted Fury pulling our family’s whisky towards me, with my father and brother inside.

“Father!” I called, urging Flame into a full gallop. I met the small carriage and stopped beside it.

My father looked alarmed to see me wearing breeches, skirts rucked up, and riding a horse that had never had a rider on its back, so many miles from home. “Clara! What’s the matter?” he said.

“The baby is coming. You need to get home!”

“Now? She’s having the baby
now?
You did not leave her
alone
, did you?”

“No, I fetched Dr. Flagg. Dr. Lerned was away.”

“Joss, we need to get home as fast as we can,” Father
exclaimed. “Let’s go!” He turned back to me. “You look near to having heat stroke, Clara. So does Flame. Take her to a stream so you can both cool down, then make your way home when you can. Brown’s Brook is close by. Take a rest there awhile, Daughter, in the shade. You have earned one today.”

Joss shook the reins to start Fury towards home. I watched the whisky disappear down the road, and then slid off Flame. “You deserve a rest, too, my friend. Let us walk together as slowly as we please back to Brown’s Brook.”

It took nearly half an hour to get back to the brook. There the overhanging woods were thick and the shade beneath was deliciously cool. Flame went straight to the water and drank her fill.

Kneeling down by the stream, I cupped my hands to sip a little, too, and then splashed the rest over my burning face. I reached under my skirt to untie my pocket, set it carefully on a rock safely way from the burbling water, then sat down right in the brook itself.

A few minutes later, I reached over to open my pocket and took out my comb. “Might as well put this time to good use,” I said to myself. I undid my pigtails and brought the unbound strands around so I could take a good look at them, then started combing my hair.

After what seemed like an age, I pulled my hair
forward with very sore arms to look at it again. There was no sign whatsoever of a “beautiful shade of black.”

“This is not working! Not working at all!” I exclaimed aloud. I thought of all I had gone through to get this miracle-working comb, and it was not working any miracles. After all that had happened today, the realization that I was stuck with the reddest of red hair was the very last straw.

I burst into tears and, sobbing, re-braided my hair. Then I lay down completely in the stream and let the water flow over me.

A short while later, the loud report of a musket shot, loud enough to hear over the rushing of the brook, came from the direction of Contoocookville. Startled, I lifted my head out of the water and listened intently. I heard no more shots fired, but I distinctly heard what sounded like a thousand maddened sheep
baa-
ing far in the distance. I knew that no one had a flock of that size nearby. Wondering what this could be, I let my head fall back into the water and went back to my brokenhearted crying.

C
HAPTER 33

After a few minutes, despite my own noisy sobs and the burbling of the brook, I heard something new: the creaking and clopping noise of a carriage and a team of horses coming towards Brown’s Brook. A
large
carriage, by the sound of it, and a large team.

I sat up in the water to peer through the woods toward the road. A six-horse stagecoach soon pulled partway into the woods and came to a stop.
Perhaps the horses need a drink of water,
I thought, puzzled.

But instead of someone unhitching the team so the horses could drink from the brook, someone inside started throwing things out the coach windows. Brightly colored things. Red and yellow and white and pink and . . .
Why, they are
roses
! Hundreds of roses!
I thought.
Those men are throwing roses into the woods. What on earth is going on?

Even Flame looked rather curious about these proceedings.

Just then, I saw a gentleman climb down from the carriage and walk towards me.

He was a tall man, broad-shouldered, with short
brown hair and large, expressive eyes. He was dressed simply in tan nankeen pants and a blue broadcloth coat with gilt buttons. As he walked towards me, he leaned upon a cane. Despite his beak of a nose, his was a most pleasing face. It was a face that was strangely familiar—and a tiny bit chubby.

“Sir?” I called, covered in confusion as much as I was in brook water. “Why are they throwing these roses away?”

He laughed. “It is a bit of a guilty secret,
mademoiselle.
” His words were slow and deliberate. “You see, everywhere I go, people keep giving me roses, roses, and more roses! Whatever I ride in—be it barouche, or curricle, or coach—it is filled to overflowing with them! Because of this, every once in a while I must tell the small lie—that I must make the stop that is necessary—and that I need my privacy. Then I find a secluded nook like this and we cast out all the pretty flowers. Please do not tell anyone. I beg of you.”