Emma Field Book I - coming of age in the changing times of the mid-19th century

Chapter XV - Smoking John

The waxing moon was hanging high over the ridge to the east as Emma crested the hill. Smoke seeped heavily from the grey of the chimney to the almost dark sky. Everything seemed heavy and grey – the sky, the smoke, her heart.

"Hello!" came a voice from the darkness of the smoke-filled cabin. Emma jumped. "It's just me, John. I hope you don't mind, but I came back to tell you what I'd asked of Father and saw that the fire had burned low. I didn't want it to go out."

"Oh."

"I'm just sitting here, slowly smoking myself like a leg of ham – ," he broke off, noticing her face. "What's wrong, Emma?"

The girl reopened the door behind her, coughing from the smoke. It escaped as she sat heavily on the settle.

"She died. Right there. I was standing beside her and she died."

John sat on the chair and rubbed his eyes. Smoke curled around him on its way to the door. "Mrs. Plank?"

"Yes." The log in the fireplace sizzled and spat in the silence. Emma tossed her head toward the fireplace, "The wood – is that from just inside the woodshed?"

"Yes. It's wet, isn't it? I'm not very good with fires – Mother and the girls always tend to them at home. Where is the dry wood? I'll go and get some."

Emma stood up wearily. "It's against the far wall. You wouldn't have known that."

John dashed out the door and Emma followed to bring in pieces of birchbark and chips of wood.

"It's such a strange feeling," she said a few minutes later, teasing the pale coals with the white curls of birchbark. "I have never seen anyone die before. It wasn't...I don't know how to describe it...it wasn't dramatic...it just happened and...it was as though everything bad in Mrs. Plank disappeared. She was just a woman, John. Just a woman who had an awful life...but she wasn't the Devil. She wasn't even evil any more."

Emma turned around on her heels, still crouching on the hearth. "I wouldn't say it was beautiful, but it was calm and peaceful. How could that be?" She added three chips of wood to the burning bark. John sighed and leaned on the table, watching her. "It was calm and peaceful," she continued, "even when everything around her was so ugly and complicated."

"Like stepping under an eave in a thunderstorm?" he asked.

"Yes, exactly like that. The thunderstorm goes on but where you are, under the eaves, it is safe and peaceful."

"Well, it has been a thunderstorm...with daughters being beaten, husbands dying, and babies being killed. But it's over now."

Emma sat on the hearth, wrapped her arms around her belly, and rocked back and forth. "That's what I'm worried about, John: I don't think that everything is over. What did your father say?"

"About how babies die?"

"Yes." Emma glanced at him, her lip quivering slightly.

"It was like I said earlier. Babies die from diseases and – "

"Blows!" she interrupted. "I wanted you to ask about blows to a mother's belly. Can a blow kill a baby?"

"I asked about that and he said that it would have to be an awfully big blow."

"It was," she said, her voice pinched.

"What did you say?"

"I said that it was a big blow to Mrs. Plank's belly...and..." Emma sniffled and her body shook. Tears started to pour from her tired eyes and she buried her face in her lap. "I need to tell you something...but you can't ever tell another..."

John nodded his head.

"I may have killed that baby, John. I didn't mean to. It was the day we took Vera. Mrs. Plank was going to attack Dr. Watson and I rushed at her, hard. So hard I could feel...I could feel the baby against my shoulder. I didn't mean to – honestly, I didn't. But I do fear that I killed it – I think I killed a baby... Whoever does things like that? Maybe I'm the Devil, John! Maybe it's me!" Emma wailed.

Through her tears she glanced up at John, sure he would be making ready to leave. Instead, he was leaning forward, his elbow on his knee, his forehead in the palm of his hand. He looked sideways at Emma, then lowered himself to the hearth beside her, his right leg curled under him. Gently he touched her damp chin with the tips of his rough fingers.

"Look at me," he said quietly. Slowly Emma raised her eyes to his. "Did you rescue Vera for her good or yours, Emma Field?"

"For hers, of course."

"Would the Devil rescue someone?"

"No, I suppose not. It was an accident, but maybe the Devil made me do it."

"If someone stepped on a caterpillar she didn't see, would you think that the Devil made her do it?"

"No, but I did see Mrs. Plank. I tried to stop her."

"And she hurt herself. She did. She may have hurt the baby too. There were many little decisions made in that moment but I don't see the Devil in any of them. You wanted to protect Vera. Maybe Mrs. Plank was even trying to do the same...If you can see that she wasn't driven by the Devil, you have to see that you weren't either."

"I suppose you are right," Emma said after a pause.

John let his hand drop to the warm bricks. Fire licked along the dry piece of wood.

"You don't think that I'm crazy, do you?" Emma asked at last. John shook his head. "Should I say something to someone? Dr. Watson maybe?"

John shook his head again, more slowly this time. He stood up.

"I don't think so but I guess it depends. If it would make you feel better, then do, but I don't think that you are under any obligation to tell anyone."

"Oh, I don't know. Maybe it doesn't need to happen tonight anyway." She sighed deeply. "I feel better now. Thank you. Thank you for what you've done, John."

"I didn't do anything."

"It feels as if you did."

Suddenly the door swung open. "Supper ready, Em...? Oh! I didn't know that you were here, John."

"Hello, Mr. Field. I was just going...Goodbye, Emma." John took his hat from the table and nodded his head at Emma. "Mr. Field," he said and nodded his head again.

Emma added another log to the fire and leaned her head against her knees.

"Do you think that it is a good idea entertaining young men in my absence?" her father asked accusingly as he poured water into the basin.

"I wasn't entertaining him."

"You weren't? It certainly looked like it to me. It's not wise, Emma. You should never be alone with a man at this stage in your life and, besides, he is of a different standing from us. You are a tenant farmer's daughter. Why do you continue to forget that?"

His daughter rose and turned her back to him, not answering. "I am going to sleep now. The stew is in the pot." Emma unfolded the settle, pulled off her woollen stockings, and crawled between the sheets. Before long the sleeves of her dress were sodden with fresh tears.