SHE RESTED for a while sitting on the slatted walkway and leaning her aching breasts forward into her hands. The air was dark with gathering rain. A woman went past laden with a feedbag in which something alive struggled mutely. When she spoke the woman gave her an empty look and went on. She rose after a while and went on herself, the dust warm and soft as talc beneath her toes. There were some men standing in front of a store on the other side of the road and they were watching her. She set her shoulders back a little. Then a man came out of a building on the left and crossed in front of her and as he did he tipped his hat, a brief gesture as if swatting idly at a fly. There was a trace of a smile at his mouthcorners.
Hey, she said.
Hey yourself.
She was watching him go on. You ain't a doctor are ye? she called after him.
He stopped and looked back. No, he said. A lawyer. I get the winners, he gets the losers. He was standing in the middle of the road smiling a little, his hand gone to the brim of his hat again.
Well listen, she said, where's they a doctor at?
The lawyer tucked a long forefinger into his waistcoat pocket and fished forth a watch. He snapped it open, looked at it, looked at the sun where it rode darkly as if to verify the hour in that way. He won't be in till about one-thirty, he said. It's ten till now. He snapped shut the watch-case and slipped it into his vest once more. Is it urgent? he said.
What?
Are you in a hurry? His office is in the same building as mine. We sort of mind shop for one another. Right over here. He pointed to a three-storey house with tall windows in the upper part and lettering on the glass.
She looked, brushing back the hair from her face.
What seems to be the trouble? Is it serious? Or were you asking for someone else?
No. It's me.
Yes. Well. Are you sick? I could let you rest in my office until he gets in if you'd like.
She looked across the street toward the house and she looked at the lawyer. I don't want to put ye out none, she said.
No, he said. No trouble. I'm on my way back now.
Well, she said, I would appreciate you showin me where he's at.
Sure, he said. Come along.
She fell in behind him and they crossed the road, her shuffling along rapidly to keep up, watching the backs of his heels, the curved wheeltracks and moonshaped mule-prints, until they reached the walkway and on a little further to the building where he stepped to one side and motioned with his hand. After you, he said.
She started up the long dark stairwell, feeling under her naked feet the cold print of nailheads reared from the worn boards. At the top was a small parlor and on either side a door. She turned and looked down at him.
Here, he said. He went past her and set a key in the lock and held the door open for her to enter. Sit down, he said. She looked about, then backed up to and sat in a sort of morris chair with gouts of horsehair erupting from the splayed seams in the leather. She sat with her toes together and her hands in her lap and looked at the floor.
Well, he said. Where do you hail from?
She raised her eyes. He was sitting at his desk, his feet propped into an open drawer, his head bent forward while he held a match to a cigar.
I just come over from acrost the river, she said.
He had been puffing at the cigar and he stopped and gave her a quick look and then went on and got it lit and flipped the match toward an ashtray on the desk. You feel all right? he said.
Tolerable thank ye.
Well the doctor will be along directly.
All right, she said. Listen.
Yes.
I wanted to ast ye somethin afore I seen him.
All right. What is it?
Well, she said. I ain't got but a dollar and I know doctors is costy and what I was wonderin was if he could do me much good for just a dollar.
The lawyer plucked the cigar slowly from his mouth and folded his hands in a coil of blue smoke. I reckon he'll do you at least a dollar's worth, he said. What was your trouble? If you don't mind me asking.
Well, I'd rather just tell him if you don't care.
Yes. Well I'm sure he'll do something for you. He's a good doctor. Anyway we'll know directly.
I don't want to ast no favors from nobody, she said.
Favors?
Yessir. I mean if it's more'n a dollar I'd just as leave not bother him.
He lifted his feet from the drawer and leaned his elbows on the desk. If you need a doctor, he said, it's not too easy to do without. It's not like needing a pair of shoes or ... she was looking nervously at her feet, one crossed over the top of the other ... or say a new skillet or something. You just tell him what your trouble is and let him worry about how much to charge. If you don't have but a dollar he might let you pay the rest later on. Or bring him some eggs. Or garden stuff when ...
I ain't got nary garden, she said.
Well anyway you let him worry about it.
Yessir, she said.
He leaned back again. It was very quiet in the room. The light waxed and waned and the squatting shape of the windowsash came and went on the wood floor like something breathing. Are you married? he said.
No, she said. Then she looked up and said: I mean I ain't now. I was but I ain't now.
You a widow then?
Yessir.
Well that's a pity. Young woman like you. You got any babies?
One.
Yes.
The room was growing darker. A gust of damp air moved upon them and the frayed lace curtains at the window lifted.
Looks like we're fixing to have some rain, he said.
But it had already started, the glass staining with random slashes, the hot stone ledge steaming.
We get a lot of rain here in the fall, the lawyer said. After it's too late to do anything any good.
They sat in the gathering dark and watched the rain. After a while the lawyer put his feet down again and rose from the chair. That's him now, he said.
She nodded. He went to the door and peered out. She could hear someone stamping and swearing their way up the stairwell.
Looks like you got a little damp there, John, the lawyer said.
The other one said something she couldn't hear.
Well you got one waiting on you.
He looked through the door. A short heavy man with moustaches from which water dripped, peering above the rim of his fogged spectacles. How do, he said.
Hidy, she said.
Just come on in over here. He disappeared and she rose and crossed the floor before the lawyer and gave him a little curtsying nod, ragged, shoeless, deferential and half deranged, and yet moving in an almost palpable amnion of propriety. I sure thank ye, she said.
The lawyer nodded and smiled. That's all right, he said.
When she entered the doctor's office he had his back to the door, shaking out and hanging up his wet coat on a rack. He turned, brushing the dampness from his shoulders, his shirt plastered transparently to his skin there.
Whew, he said. Well now. What was your trouble young lady?
She looked behind her. The lawyer had closed his door. She could hear the rain outside and it was dark enough to want a lamp.
Over here, he said. Take a seat.
Thank ye, she said. She took the chair near his desk and sat, primly, tucking her feet beneath the rungs. When she looked up he was sitting at the desk mopping furiously at the lenses of his spectacles with a handkerchief.
Now, he said. What was it?
Well, it's about my milk.
Your milk?
Yessir. Kindly.
You ain't fevered are you?
No. It ain't that. I mean I don't know. It's my own milk I meant.
Yes. He leaned back and ran one finger alongside his nose, the glasses poised in midair. You're nursing a baby. Is that what it is?
She didn't answer for a minute. Then she said: Well, no. She stopped again and looked up at him for help. He was looki
ng out the window. He turned back and put the glasses on his nose.
All right, he said. First: Are we talking about cow milk or people milk?
People, she said.
Right. Yours?
Yessir.
All right. You have been nursing a baby then.
No, she said. I ain't never nursed him. That's what's ailin me.
You had a baby?
Yessir.
When?
Early of the spring. March I believe it was.
That's six months ago, the doctor said.
Yes, she said.
The doctor leaned forward and laid one arm out upon the desk and studied his hand. Well, he said, I reckon then you must of had a wetnurse. And now you want to know why you never had any milk. After six months.
No sir, she said. That ain't it.
It's not getting any easier, is it?
No sir. They smart a good bit.
You never had any milk.
I never needed none but I had too much all the time.
He looked at the hand as if perhaps it would tell him something and then perhaps it did because he looked up at her and he said: What happened to the baby?
It died.
Of late?
No. The day it was borned.
And you still have milk.
It ain't that so much. I don't mind it. It's that they startin to bleed. My paps.
Then they were both quiet for a long time. The room was almost dark and they could hear the steady small slicing of the rain on the glass and the spat of it on the stone sill. He spoke next. Very quietly. He said: You're lying to me.
She looked up. She didn't seem surprised. She said: About what part?
You tell me. Either about your breasts or about the baby. No woman carries milk six months for a dead baby.
She didn't say anything.
Do you want to show me?
What?
I said do you want to show me? Your breasts?
All right, she said. She stood and unbuttoned the shift at the neck and slid the shoulders down so that she was standing with her arms pinioned in the rotten cloth. It was all she wore.
Yes, he said. All right. I'll give you something for that. It must be very painful.
She worked the dress back over her shoulders and turned to do the buttons. It smarts some, she said.
Have you been pumping them? Milking them?
No sir. They just run by their own selves.
Yes. You should milk them though. Where is the baby?
I don't know. I mean I ain't seen it since it was borned but I believe I know who's got it if I could find him.
And when was it? That it was born.
I believe it was in March but it could of been April.
That's not possible, he said.
Well it was March then.
Look, the doctor said, what difference does it make if it was later than that? Like maybe in July.
I wouldn't of cared, she said.
The doctor leaned back. You couldn't still have milk after six months.
If he was dead. That's what you said wasn't it? She was leaning forward in the chair watching him. That means he ain't, don't it? That means he ain't dead or I'd of gone dry. Ain't it?
Well, the doctor said. But something half wild in her look stopped him. Yes, he said. That could be what it means. Yes.
I knowed it all the time, she said. I guess I knowed it right along.
Yes, he said. Look, let me give you this salve. He swung about in his chair and rose and unlocked a cabinet behind his desk. He studied the interior for a moment and then selected a small jar and closed the cabinet door again. Now, he said, turning and holding up the jar. I want you to put this on good and heavy and keep it on all the time. If it wears off put more. And you'll have to pump them even if it hurts. Try it a little bit first. He slid the jar across the desk to her and she took it and looked at it and sat holding it in her lap.
Come back in a couple of days and tell me how you're doing.
I don't know as I'll be here, she said.
Where will you be?
I don't know. I got to get on huntin him.
The baby?
Yessir.
When did you see it last? You said you never nursed it.
I ain't seen it since it was borned.
Then what was the part you lied about?
Well. About it bein dead.
Yes. What did happen?
He said it was puny but afore God it weren't puny a bit.
And what happened then?
We never had nothin nor nobody.
You're not married are you?
No sir.
And what happened? Was the baby given away?
Yes, she said. I never meant for him to do that. I wasn't ashamed. He said it died but I knowed that for a lie. He lied all the time.
Who did?
My brother.
The doctor leaned back in the chair and folded his hands in his lap and looked at them. After a while he said: You don't know where the baby is?
No sir.
Below them in the street cattle were being driven lowing through the rain and the mud.
Where do you live? the doctor said. What's your name?
Rinthy Holme.
And where do you live then.
I don't live nowheres no more, she said. I never did much. I just go around huntin my chap. That's about all I do any more.
THE ROAD MADE a switchback at the top of the hill and then ran along the ridge so that following it he had a long time to watch the river below him, slow and flat, a dead clay color and wrinkling viscously in the late afternoon light. The road was good until it started down the bluff and then it was washed out again and muddy and plugged with the tracks of mired horses or men or small things that had crossed it in the night. When the road reached the river it went right on into the water and he could see that the water was up. There was a heavy timbered scaffold and a ferrycable running from it out across the river, bellying almost into the current and rising again at the far side. A voice was coming from the far side too but he could not understand what it said. After a while he saw a man come from the ferry and stand on the bank and put his hands to his mouth and then in a minute came the voice again faint with distance. It was just a voice with no words to it. He cupped his own hands to shout but he could think of nothing to shout so he let them fall again and after a while the man went back to the ferry and he couldn't see him any more.
Holme found a dry place in the grass to sit and he watched the river. It was very high and went past with a dull hiss like poured sand. The air had turned cool and the sky looked gray and wintry. Some birds came upriver, waterbirds with long necks, and he watched them. After a while he slept.
When he woke it was growing late and he could see the ferry on the river. What woke him was a horse and when he turned to look there was a man at the landing holding the reins while the horse drank in the river. Holme rose and stretched himself. Howdy, he said.
Howdy, the man said.
You goin acrost?
No, he said. He was watching the ferry.
Holme rubbed his palms together and hunched his shoulders in the cold.
He thinks I am, the rider said.
He does?
Yes. He jerked the horse's head up and ran his palm along its neck. You reckon that's half way, he said.
What's that? Holme said.
The man pointed. The ferry yander. You reckon she's half way here?
Holme watched the ferry coming quarterwise toward them with the snarl of water breaking on the upriver side of her hull. Yes, he said. I allow he's a bit nigher here than yander.
That's right, the man said. Hard to tell where half way is on a river unless you're in the middle of it. He pulled the horse's head around and put one toe in the stirrup and mounted upward all in one motion and went back up the road in a mudsucking canter.
The ferry was the size of a small keelboat. It slowed
in the slack shore currents and nosed easily into the mud. The ferryman was standing on the forward deck adjusting the ropes.
Howdy, Holme said.
You still cain't cross. You a friend of that son of a bitch?
Him? No. I was asleep and he come up.
I'm fixin to get me one of them spyglasses anyways, the ferryman said. He came from the barge deck with a little hop and seized up nearly to his knees in the soft mud and cursed and kicked his boots about and made his way to the higher ground. Yes, he said. One of them spyglasses put a stop to that old shit. He was raking his boots in the grass to clean them. He wore a little leather vest and a strange sort of hat that appeared vaguely nautical. Holme chewed on a weed and watched him.
Little old spyglass be just the thing to fix him with, the man said.
What all does he do? Holme said.
The ferryman looked at him. Do? he said. You seen him. Just like that. He does it all the time. Been doin it for two year now. All on account of a little argument. Sends his old lady over to Morgan for him. I ort by rights to quit haulin her fat ass.
Holme nodded his head vaguely.
So anyway you still cain't cross till I get a horse.
All right, Holme said.
People is just a dime. Horses is four bits.
All right.
I cain't afford to make no crossin for no dime.
No. How long do ye reckon it'll be afore a horse comes?
I couldn't say, mister.
I ain't seen many people usin this road.
Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. It was busy yesterday evenin. I ain't never been more'n a day or two without somebody come along.
Day or two? Holme said.
They be somebody along directly.
I sure would hate to have to wait any day or two.
They ort to be somebody along directly.
It's nigh dark now, Holme said.
They come of a night same as they do of a day, the ferryman said. It's all the same to me. You goin to Morgan?
If it's yan side of this river and in the road I'm goin thew it.
Good little old town, Morgan. Say you ain't never been there?
No, Holme said.
Good little old town, the ferryman said again. He squatted in the grass, looking out over the river. Say you don't aim to lay over there?
No, Holme said. I don't reckon.
Well, I don't ast nobody their business.