“The heat up on that roof must have addled your brains.” Becca glared at Ben after the door shut softly behind the nurse. “What’s the matter with you?”
He didn’t answer Becca because he didn’t know what was the matter with him. Something about Francine put him on edge. Not Francine. Nurse Howard. He wasn’t on a first-name basis with the woman. Wouldn’t likely ever be on a first-name basis with her. She wasn’t one of them. She was from beyond the mountains, where people didn’t understand mountain ways.
He’d come across that enough in the army. Always having to prove he had enough sense to do whatever needed to be done. Not having money didn’t mean a man didn’t have brains. His sergeant had accused him of having a chip on his shoulder and maybe he did. Maybe he’d let it show with the nurse. That didn’t mean he wanted to admit it.
“Well?” Becca wasn’t one to let something ride.
“I said what I thought. She had no reason to be bothered.” He should have kept quiet. That sounded lame even to his ears.
“Times is when a body don’t let out ev’ry thought.” His mother looked up from her beans. “Run after Miss Nurse, Sadie, and tell her to wait a minute for that mess of beans we promised her. Becca, get a sack out of the drawer for me.”
Sadie slipped past him to go out the door, her eyes too big, as though he scared her.
He met his mother’s steady gaze. “I’m sorry.”
“It ain’t me you need to say that to.” She slipped a couple of handfuls of beans into the sack Becca gave her.
“Some things are best left alone,” Ben said.
“Could be you’re right.” His mother peered out the window and then handed the beans to Becca. “Appears she’s waiting. Run these on out to her.”
“Should I tell her we’re sorry?” Becca took the sack of beans and shot Ben a look. “That Ben’s sorry?”
Ben shut his eyes a second to hide his irritation. He’d known it would be different coming home to a houseful of women after living with his army brothers for years. Women were always ready with hurt feelings. Men just socked somebody in the nose if they got mad. Could be somebody should have socked him in the nose for upsetting the nurse. She hadn’t intended to rile him. He wasn’t even sure what had poked those rude words out of him.
“I can do my own apologizing.” He reached out and took the sack from Becca when she started to step past him. “Here. I’ll take them out to her.”
Becca gave him a look as she handed over the sack of beans, but for once, she kept her mouth shut.
He stepped out on the porch in time to hear Woody say, “You ain’t mad, are you, Nurse Howard? I took a little while coming back from the creek. You said you didn’t want Jasmine tired out.”
“I’m not upset. You did exactly what I asked. Jasmine needed a drink.” The nurse didn’t seem to notice Ben on the porch as she reached for her mare’s reins. Instead she looked at Sadie beside her. “You best back up, Sadie. Jasmine can be a little fractious at times. Except when Woody is riding her.”
“But ain’t you gonna wait for the beans, Nurse?” Sadie stepped over behind Woody.
“Thank your mother for me, but I’ll try those purple beans another time.” She put her foot in the stirrup and mounted her horse in one graceful movement.
Ben couldn’t keep from admiring how she sat in the saddle. She really was lovely, even with her hair tucked up and wearing her frontier nurse blue pants and vest. It might be interesting to see her in a dress going to a dance. He put the brakes on his thoughts. He was here to apologize. Not ask her to a dance.
“No need to wait.” He held up the sack of beans. “Here they are.”
For a few seconds, he thought she was going to flick her reins and take off. But then she relaxed her hands and turned toward him with that same forced smile she had given him inside. “Then, I’ll be glad to take them. I’m sure Nurse Dawson and I will enjoy them for our supper.”
He stepped over to the woman on the horse, too aware of Woody and Sadie watching him. Watching them. He could take care of that. “Woody, go find some coal oil to get that paint off your face, and Sadie, you get on back in the house and help Ma.”
Ben waited until Sadie scampered back into the house and Woody headed toward the shed with a curious glance over his shoulder. Becca was probably watching out the window, but at least none of them were right there peering over his shoulder.
He handed the sack of beans to the nurse. “Ma says I need to apologize for speaking my mind.”
“This is your house, Mr. Locke. You are free to say whatever you want.” Her voice was stiff.
“Free. That’s a good word. Free.” He put his hand on her horse’s nose when the mare turned toward his voice. “And home. They were words to dwell on while I was over there.”
Her voice softened and her smile looked almost genuine. “Now you have both. Home and free.”
“So I do. But sometimes I still need a sergeant to keep me in line. Ma. You.”
“I’m not a sergeant and I do well to keep myself in line. Nurse Dawson is always telling me I forget my place at times.”
“What is your place?”
She looked a little puzzled by his question. “Sometimes I wonder.” She looked away from him, then out toward the mountains. “But I do love it here. The trees. The hills. Even the rocks.”
“The snakes?”
“The snakes not so much.” She patted her mare’s neck.
“What about the people?”
She let her gaze come back to him. “I like the people too. I admire women like your mother, and how could I not love youngsters like Sadie. There is something real about the people here.”
“People aren’t real where you come from up in the city?”
“I guess that did sound foolish. But whether you like me saying it or not, the people here are different from the people I grew up with.”
“Yeah, they probably had shoes.”
She kept her eyes locked on him. “You have shoes.”
He lifted his foot up. “So I do. Compliments of Uncle Sam. But it could be I ought to take them off since I seem to keep sticking my foot in my mouth. Shoe leather is tough on the teeth. Then again that’s something else outsiders don’t expect us mountain folk to have. Teeth.”
She frowned a little at that, but instead of responding, she twisted around in the saddle to stuff the sack of beans in the top of the saddlebag. “Tell your mother thank you for me. She has a generous heart.”
“And I act like I have no heart at all.” Ben reached for the mare’s bridle before the nurse could turn the horse away.
“I wouldn’t say that. I see your heart for your family. For the mountains.” Her polite smile came out again as she looked at his hand on her mare’s bridle. “It’s been a pleasure talking with you, Mr. Locke, but I need to be on my way.”
“Sure.” He turned loose of the bridle and stepped back. “But I am sorry, Sarge. Really.”
An actual smile slipped out on her face. “You’re going to have to stop calling me that.”
“But weren’t you the one who told me to call you Sergeant?”
She shook her head. “A momentary lapse of good judgment.”
“What’s the matter? Can’t nurses have fun?”
“Of course. The same as sergeants, but I’m guessing your sergeants in the army let you know when it was time for fun and when it was time to attend to your duties. I need to be about my duty as a nurse.” She turned her horse’s head and flicked the reins. The mare cantered out of the yard.
“Don’t get lost,” Ben called after her.
“Very funny.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “We’ll be fine as long as the snakes stay out of our path.”
He watched her out of sight with an odd urge to trail after her to be sure she didn’t meet any of those snakes. But he didn’t even have a horse. And no reason to feel responsible for her. She’d traversed these hills through snakes and more before he got home. Other people had pointed her in the right direction if she got lost.
But it was time to go hunting a horse. Or a truck. Maybe both. A man couldn’t always go shanks’ mare. He’d done enough walking the last few years to last a lifetime. He didn’t have to walk now. He stared out at the trail the nurse had disappeared down. The storekeeper said folks had trucks that could go most anywhere. If he cut a tree here and there, he could probably get one of those trucks nearly up to the house.
With the way people were going to automobiles, they’d be building roads. Until then, a man could get plenty of places by driving in creek beds. If a man had a motor vehicle, he could drive clear out of the mountains, if that was what he wanted to do.
For three long years he’d thought about coming home and now here he was thinking about leaving. Maybe that was why the nurse seemed to be drawing him. Because she was from beyond the hills. But she’d come here by choice.
He’d come home by choice. Wanted to be here with his family. It was just that he wasn’t sure what the future could hold.
If only his father were still there to help him get his head straight. To figure out what he should do. Ben shut his eyes and remembered his pa now and again taking a rest on the porch. Back then, Ben could talk any problem out with him. Most of the time, his pa would open up his Bible to help find the answers.
Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.
That was one from Proverbs Pa liked to point out to Ben. Trust. Believe. Listen. That was his father’s way. Ben had carried a Bible all through the war, and while he hadn’t opened it as much as he should have, whenever he did, it was as though his father was sitting down right beside him to point out Scriptures he needed to see. Psalm 46:1 pulled him through some dark days. God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
With the thought of that verse, he could almost hear his pa speaking in his head. The Lord was with you over there, son, but you got to remember he come home with you too. The good Lord is everywhere around us. You just have to be still and listen for him.
“You done been staring down that empty path a long while, Benjamin.” Somebody spoke up behind him. Not Becca or his mother.
Granny Em leaned against the side of the porch watching him. He had no idea how long she’d been there.
“Here you ain’t been home but a week and yo’r feet done wanting to go wandering.”
He wasn’t surprised to see her there. Granny Em had a way of appearing out of nowhere ever since he could remember. His mother, she with the generous heart the nurse had spoken about, had claimed the old woman kin even without any blood ties. His father had been a bit warier of the woman’s ways. Ben tried to remember why, but nothing came to mind other than her way of coming up on him unawares. That had always irritated his father.
“My feet are right here at home.” Ben stepped back toward the porch.
“Then it must be that girl what was drawing your eyes.”
“She was here to see Becca. Seems a fair nurse.”
Granny Em’s eyes crinkled up in a smile. “For a brought-in girl, she ain’t bad. Did Becca tell her about the dogwood bark?”
“Dogwood bark?”
“Good to settle the upheavals in a body’s stomach that a baby comin’ can cause.”
“You’ll have to ask Becca about that. I was up on the roof when the nurse went inside. Trying to stop it leaking before the next rain.”
“Climbed down pretty quick then, I’m thinking.” The old woman raised one eyebrow at him.
“We got finished.”
She stepped back and peered up at the roof. “Appears you did. But you should have used tar. That shiny paint won’t be no help.”
“It’s what Pa always used.”
“And always had leaks.” She headed toward the steps. “I reckon I better go see what Becca told the girl. See if them nurses are ready to run me off the mountain.”
“I don’t think anything could do that, could it?”
“That other nurse, the one that weren’t here today, would like to, but this’n that was here, she’ll stop and talk to a feller.” Granny Em shot him another smile. “Appears she’s more than ready to stop and talk to some fellers.”
“She likes Woody.”
“Most ev’rybody does that. The boy ain’t never met no strangers. But I’m thinking that ain’t the only feller that girl is ready to spend some words on. It ain’t all nursing with her. Times is she even pays some mind to what I has to say to her.” The old woman grabbed hold of the rail next to the steps and pulled herself up. She looked back at Ben. “And she ain’t particularly hard on the eyes neither.”
With a cackle something like a hen that just laid an egg, she went on into the house. Ben didn’t follow her inside. He’d had enough of women for a while. Instead he walked off down the hill to find somebody with a horse to sell. His ma wouldn’t worry about him. She’d know he’d be back.
But it could be the next time Nurse Howard came to see Becca, he’d be better served to find something to keep him busy out in the field or woods. Hard on the eyes or not.