It’s Saturday morning and Dr. Nesbitt has mowed the lawn, trimmed the hedge, and swept the stoop—all before breakfast.
It’s steamy hot with no breeze. “If he starts chopping firewood,” Mrs. Nesbitt says, fanning herself at the kitchen table, “I’m calling a doctor!”
I smile and weave my mending needle into a frayed milking smock Mrs. Nesbitt plans to give Dot. I don’t know how she’s going to do it though, since we’ve been acting like Dot doesn’t have that unspeakable baby growing inside her.
Mrs. Nesbitt folds her hands and says matter-of-factly, “He knows.”
I stare a hole through her. “Cecil knows about Dot?”
“No, Iris, Avery knows.” She glances out the window at her son marching toward the house with the freshly oiled shotgun. She whispers fast. “He told me he’d figured it out. That’s why he’s so wound up, why we all are…” She shakes her head.
Dr. Nesbitt steps in, props the gun by the door, his expression grim. “Mother, could you please stay by the phone. I’m expecting a call anytime. I think I’ll have a delivery today.”
Before I can catch it, “Dot?” pops out of my mouth. We sit a moment surrounded by my stunning stupidity. “Of course it’s not Dot… yet,” I blubber. “I’m sorry. She’s not… I won’t…”
Cows bawl. Wasps float around their nest in the window casement.
“I know, Iris. Dot seems to be the only girl in the whole world expecting a baby,” Mrs. Nesbitt says.
Dr. Nesbitt swipes his hands on his work pants. “Well, Cora started labor prematurely. I think I heard two heartbeats last week. Twins run in Ellis’s family. I’d like you to come along to help, Iris.”
My stomach drops. I poke the needle in my finger, my face hot and undoubtedly as red as the bright bubble of blood I blot on my napkin. “Yes, sir,” I say, trying to imagine how I can do anything useful besides boil water and wring my fingers into knots.
I catch Mrs. Nesbitt watching me. “You give an excellent hand massage. I am sure you will do wonderfully.”
Dr. Nesbitt nods and crunches down the driveway for the mail. Moments later he plops a Sears and Roebuck catalog and a letter for me on the table and carries the rest to his room. Celeste’s handwriting.
Ugh…
I stuff the envelope in my pocket. It can wait.
Mrs. Nesbitt and I get busy too, as though chores can make Dot go away. But I know busyness won’t erase Celeste, or Dot’s baby, or my impossible awkwardness. And all the busywork in the world can’t stop the train to Kansas City in September with me on board.
Just the same, I straighten the linen closet, reline Mrs. Nesbitt’s hankie box with fresh paper, gather eggs, and make corn muffins. I even give Marie a bath with Dr. Nesbitt’s car-washing water. We clean out the pantry and pack the backseat of the car with canned peaches and apple butter and a cardboard box of old quilt scraps and towels. Dr. Nesbitt adds his flashlight, extra batteries, his black bag, and a box of matches. This could be quite a night.
Long after supper the telephone rings, and we’re off.
The steamy heat has collected itself into droplets that wash the windshield as we navigate our way to Cora’s.
Standing on the worn wood porch are a yellow cat and Ellis, Cora’s lanky husband. Both look like they’ve been living on an empty stomach. “Cora’s water shed,” Ellis mumbles, bumping his head on the door frame as we go inside.
While Dr. Nesbitt examines her, I boil water, refold the rags, and avoid the bedroom. Finally he calls me in.
I stop dead away at the door. A boggy, toadstool smell mixes with Cora’s moaning and panting. She’s dark-haired and ghosty-white with a fistful of damp bedding in each hand.
I step back. Dim curtains draw around my eyes. I grab the door handle and count my breaths.
Cora turns toward me, wild-eyed. She blinks to focus and whispers hoarsely, “Get Ruthie. She’s scarit. Thinks I’m dyin’.”
Dr. Nesbitt and I turn to Ellis. “Ruthie?”
Cora’s husband looks for a moment as though he can’t place who that is. He bends down and yells under the bed. “Ruth, come out from there this minute!”
We wait.
“Ruth!” He swipes his long arm. “The doctor’s here. I said get out.”
Something stirs in me. “Please. I’ll take care of her,” I hear myself offer. I squat down and lift the dingy bed skirt. In deep shadow I make out a figure curled on her side. Above us, the mattress sags under the writhing weight of her mother and two unborn babies, who also seem scared to face the world.
I have an idea. I go in the front room and unload the quilts. With a pair of scissors from Dr. Nesbitt’s bag, I cut a paper doll girl and two tiny baby shapes out of the cardboard box.
Flat on my stomach, I poke my head under the bed. I sweep the flashlight and come face to face with Ruthie. I hold the paper doll up to the light and jiggle her like she’s talking. “Hi, Ruthie, would you like a corn muffin?”
Ruthie glues her eyes to the doll. Says nothing.
“Or would you like something to hold?” the doll asks.
Ruthie doesn’t move.
I slide a quilt scrap across the dusty plywood.
Ruthie pops her thumb in her mouth. She stares at me with perfectly round pale eyes. We stay there together a long while—with me stretched out right in Dr. Nesbitt’s path around the bed. I guess he’ll step on me if he needs my help.
Cora’s growls turn to shrieks. “I think Mother Nature can hear you now,” Dr. Nesbitt says. “Good job. She’s ready to lend a hand with these babies.”
I stretch my arm and walk the little figure toward Ruthie. “Can I lay down with you?” I say in my dolly voice. She takes the cutout and examines her in the flashlight beam.
I hear Dr. Nesbitt unlatch his black bag and rattle through it. “Damn… damn,” he whispers. I lift the bed skirt and look out. His yard shoes squeak as he steps over me. The tan leather is scarred and soft. Next thing I know he’s yanking out his shoelaces.
I turn back and show Ruthie the two lumpy cardboard baby shapes. “Hi, sister,” they say.
She giggles and reaches for them.
“We want to hug you.” Ruthie presses the cardboard girl against the babies.
Something’s happening. The weight of Cora has moved toward the foot of the bed. Dr. Nesbitt calls Ellis in from the front room. There are no newborn cries, only a new smell of wet, rusted iron—blood, earth, and sweat.
“Would you like to come out now?” I ask Ruthie.
She shakes her head no.
“That’s fine,” I say. “I’ll be right back.” I go to the kitchen and spread twin corn muffins with apple butter, put them on a plate. I carry the plate to the bedroom, kneel down, and push it across to Ruthie. She eats the muffins flat on her back, drizzling crumbs like rain. I smile. “I’ll bet the mice love you.”
In a moment Ruthie collects her dollies and quilt and crawls out. Her curly strawberry hair is matted to her face.
I carry her right out to the back porch. There’s no swing, so I feel for the step in the pitch-dark. Tree toads and crickets saw the humid air. I cradle her on my lap. I smell muffin crumbs and dusty little-girl sweat in her hair. The weight of sleep fills her legs, her back, and finally her head. I stroke her downy cheek. I make the rhythm of our breaths match.
The huge oak overhead drops its acorns on the yard. An owl floats his question across the fertile night. Hoo? Hoo?
Through the window I hear Dr. Nesbitt instruct Ellis. “These babies need your help.” His voice is kind and wise, like a traveler sure of his destination. “Okay, Cora, Ellis is going to prop you up. Move down. Push… Not the footboard, the baby. That’s right. Whoa… lookie there! He’s as long as his daddy. Push, Cora. Yell all you want, but keep pushing. Don’t hold back. Two little fellas. Wow!”
Ruth stirs. The word is out. Even the stars listen as her brothers’ cries join the night chorus. Mother Nature is bragging about her shining accomplishment.
I feel part of something magical.
An hour later Ruthie and the yellow kitty are in bed. Two sticky, froggy little boys have been washed—one by me—and wrapped, with Dr. Nesbitt’s shoelaces secured around their belly buttons.
We clean up and pack up. Dr. Nesbitt pads to the car in his stocking feet and nudges it into reverse. Two little kerosene lamp flames in the window of Ruthie’s house greet the first rays of morning.
Something is new inside me too. But it’s still too close to sort out. I only know I could stay awake forever.
Dr. Nesbitt sighs and whacks the seat. “Damn it!”
“What? Dr. Nesbitt?”
“Never once, in my whole practice life, have I ever forgotten my cord clamps. They’re totally useless sitting on the counter in my office.” He glances over at the grin on my face.
“Your shoelaces worked perfectly,” I say. “I don’t think those babies knew the difference.” Our headlights create a tunnel in the mist. “Well, a lot of help I was,” I say. “Think how many times you and Ellis had to step over me!”
“My pleasure, Iris. A bit unconventional… but you knew exactly what you were doing. Thanks to you, Cora stopped worrying about Ruthie and concentrated on those boys.”
I sit straighter on the seat. “I’d like to bake a cobbler and check in on them this afternoon. I could take Mrs. Nesbitt. She’d like that.”
Dr. Nesbitt gives me a respectful little nod and smiles. “Might you let me come along, too?”
“My pleasure,” I say, as the stars tuck themselves into the dawn.