WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 6
I approach the cabin slowly.
For much of the year the logger’s base at the foot of Burnt Hill remains empty. In spring men come up from Winthrop and Pittston to camp and harvest timber that they later send down a heavily swollen Bracket Brook toward Hallowell, where it’s bundled at the Kennebec and ferried south in rafts. But in winter, the brook fades to a trickle, and the remote camp is abandoned.
The tallest point in three counties, Burnt Hill—so named for a decades- old fire—is windswept and bitterly cold, barren at its rounded peak, except for brush and rocks. Its slopes are thick with a canopy of aging paper birch and sugar maple. As they’re cut from the hillside, one by one, trembling aspen, balsam, and spruce rise to take their place. It is the aspen that I like best, however, not just for their pale, speckled bark, and astonishing show of gold each fall, but because every aspen in this great expanse of forest is connected by a single root system. They give life, one to another, and work to replace what the loggers take. There is much that men could learn from nature if we would only listen.
Beautiful though Burnt Hill might be, the only reason anyone would make the trek out to this place in the dead of winter is to see Doctor.
Knowledge of her arrival is passed up and down the Kennebec in muted whispers, but she is only visited by those who strive to keep their secrets close.
As I ride into the clearing, a young Wabanaki family slips out the cabin door. A man, and a woman holding an infant swaddled in rabbit pelts. Both parents are draped in heavy wool blankets dyed a deep and startling red, and they wear the traditional leggings, tunics, and deerskin moccasins. The woman cradles her child close to her body and keeps her eyes on the ground, careful of each treacherous step through the snowdrifts. But the father looks to me and nods cautiously before taking the child, then helping his wife onto the horse. Once she is situated, he lifts the bundle to her again, then leads them from the clearing without a backward glance. Theirs are the only tracks in the two inches of fresh snow that blankets the clearing.
Fascinated, I wait until that flash of crimson is no longer visible between the pine boughs before I approach the cabin. In total, it is no bigger than my workroom and sits like a lopsided rectangle at the base of a small, stone outcropping. Smoke curls from the chimney, and I can hear humming within—a melodic rise and fall of voice that sounds both familiar and foreign.
I dismount Brutus and tie him to the side of a large covered wagon that sits beside the cabin. Behind it, and to the side, is a lean-to stable, built by loggers, and made from hewn, lashed timber. It rests against the rockface and is wide enough for only a single steed. Inside is the largest horse I have ever seen. Eighteen hands if he’s an inch and so ruddy he gleams like fire in the shadows. Brutus snorts at him, and he returns the gesture while I shake my head.
“It’s always a pissing contest with you men,” I say, then turn to the other horse. “And who are you?”
If I have a weakness for anything in this world it is a big, beautiful stallion.
“He is Goliath,” a voice calls out from inside the cabin. “And you, Martha Ballard, should come inside. C’est froid.”
It is cold, and I am grateful for the welcome, but I remember, at the last second, that I have brought a gift, and I go to retrieve the bottle from my saddlebag first. It is a bottle of syrup of currants and brandy, wrapped in a soft linen cloth and tied with a ribbon. I do not need Doctor’s services today
—not in the usual sense, at least—but I have not forgotten to bring payment.
“Good to see you again, Doctor,” I say, as I step inside and shrug out of my riding cloak. I hang it on a peg and brush the snow from my hair, then close the door to shut out the cold that has drifted in after me like a fog. “How did you know it was me?”
Doctor offers a knowing smile, full lips curving around small, straight teeth.
“Oh,” I say, as the answer occurs to me. “You recognized my voice.” “You would recognize mine, non?”
“Indeed.”
There is a rocking chair on either side of the fireplace and a flat, round stump between them with a lantern on top that emanates a soft, golden light. Roughly a decade younger than me, Doctor has high cheekbones and a long, slender neck. She wears a green muslin dress, and her hair is kept up and away beneath a matching headwrap. There is a mortar in her lap and a pestle in her hand. Beside her is a woven basket, lid fitted tightly on top. No doubt a gift from the Wabanaki for services rendered.
Doctor sees me looking at the basket and says, “The woman you saw outside has gone dry. She has nothing left to feed le bébé.”
I take this as my invitation to come in and sit down. As I arrange my skirts, she continues.
“It happens. No one knows why. But le bébé has not weaned. So they came to me for help.”
“Are there none in her tribe who can nurse the child for her?”
“None with milk to spare.” She looks at me as though I ought to know this. “It is winter. And many are hungry.”
“What did you tell her?”
Doctor flexes the hand that has been working the pestle. Her fingers are long and thin. Elegant. But I can see that the pinky on that hand was once broken and healed poorly. It does not fully straighten like the others. “There is nothing so good as mother’s milk, but feeding the child boiled walnuts mixed with cornmeal and water will get him to the spring when he can eat other foods.”
I did not know this, and I tell her so.
She looks me up and down, and says, “You are not ill.” “No.”
“Tell me why you’re here, then.”
I place the bottle of syrup beside the lantern. “Ellen Parker borrowed my horse this week to come see you.”
“And you are curious why?”
“No. I have enough secrets to carry. I’ve little interest in adding hers to the pile.”
“And yet you didn’t come to visit.” Doctor turns her gaze back to the mortar and pestle. She cups the rounded knob in her palm and rolls it in a counterclockwise motion against the mortar, crushing the fine, dry leaves into powder. It smells of black pepper and sage.
“Why shouldn’t I?”
“No one does. There is always a reason.” “What about Hitty?”
Doctor looks up at me sharply, dark eyes still and steady as a lake at midnight. “Not even her,” she says. “Not since she took up with cet homme.”
“I thought they were married.”
“Only…aah…what is the word…?” She laces her fingers together and holds them up.
“Handfast?”
“Yes. Not that it matters. No law recognizes a marriage—handfast or otherwise—between your kind and mine.” Doctor licks the end of her broken pinky and sets it to the fine powder in her bowl. She tastes it, thinking for a moment with eyes closed, then nods once, deciding it’s the
way she wants it, and sets the bowl on the floor beside her. “But again, you didn’t come to talk about my daughter.”
“No.”
“Tell me then.”
There are so many things about Doctor that I don’t understand. Where she comes from and where she goes when she isn’t in Hallowell? How she learned the craft of medicine and from whom? When she learned to speak English and how she became acquainted with the Wabanaki? How she travels so freely on her own as a woman in the wild? But if I could ask Doctor any question—and be guaranteed an answer—I would ask her name. What is it? Yet that is forbidden knowledge, a question that will have me immediately dismissed. So I ask what I came here to learn.
“What do you know about the herbs tansy and savine?”
Doctor answers without hesitation. “They are used to stop a child from growing in the womb. One brings les régles”—she sets a hand, fingers spread, on her lower abdomen, then clenches it into a fist—“and the other cramping. But you already knew that, non?”
“I tended a woman recently, Rebecca Foster, who took them together. A great deal from what I can gather. But she didn’t lose the child.”
“The baby wasn’t welcome?” “It was forced upon her.”
It isn’t so much that Doctor winces, but a shadow flickers through her dark, velvet eyes. Briefly. Just the ghost of an emotion, gone as quickly as it came. “So she wants to try les herbes again?”
“No. Or at least she hasn’t said so. And I wouldn’t recommend it anyway. I didn’t give them to her in the first place.”
“Bon. Savine is wicked. Kills a woman as often as it helps.”
“But will it cause harm to the child afterward—since it failed to unroot? That is what I need to know.” The idea of Rebecca Foster being left, not just with an unwanted baby, but with an invalid has made me lose more than one night’s sleep.
“No more than the mother. Is she bien?”
“I fear she’ll never be well.” I tap my chest with one finger. “In here.” Then I move that finger to my temple and tap again. “Or here.”
“You are worried she will hurt le bébé when it comes? Or herself?” “I am worried about ten thousand things.”
Doctor laughs, a deep and rich timbre that fills the cabin. “Then you haven’t learned much about being a healer.” She sees the look of hurt cross my face but doesn’t chase it with an apology. “Have you done all you can to help this woman?”
“Yes.”
“Worry only about the care you give when called upon. The rest is not yours to fret about. Ah,” Doctor says, holding up one finger. “Someone is coming.”
“Who?”
“My next patient.”
I turn to the door and listen. At first, I hear nothing but pine boughs creaking in the wind and the siskins who live deep within their branches calling to one another. But then, after a few long seconds, I detect the steady clomp of hooves making their way across the clearing.
“Who gave Madame Foster les herbes if it was not you?”
I glance at the woven basket beside her. “I believe it was the Wabanaki, though I cannot be sure. They have long been friends.”
“Ah. That is why she did not die. As to why the child stayed rooted? You must ask them. I have yet to see the Wabanaki make a mistake with les herbes.”
Doctor remains in her chair, hands folded in her lap. She nods once. I have been dismissed.
“Thank you,” I say, rising. Doctor smiles. “For what?”
“Reminding me that I am not God.”
Again, that laugh, like water over rocks. “Had you forgotten?”
“No. Only that there are some hurts I will never be skilled enough to heal.”
Inscrutable as always, Doctor only stares as I go to the door. I slide into my riding cloak and pull on my gloves. We are not friends. Not in the traditional sense. I would like it to be so, but I can sense the wall between us. A barrier impervious to my admiration. Perhaps one day I will win her over.
A knock sounds on the door.
Doctor looks at me but speaks to this new arrival. “Entrez,” she says.
I feel the cold air on my neck, feel the sudden gaze of a startled stranger. And when I turn, I find May Dawin standing at the door.
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Don’t worry. I’m just leaving,” I tell her, and then, because I do not want the girl to feel awkward for bypassing me in favor of Doctor, I add, “How is Sam?”
It is no surprise whatsoever that Sam Dawin fell headfirst in love with the girl. Apart from the fact that large men often have a penchant for tiny women—a longstanding irritation of mine—she is lovely, like a doe, all soft browns—hair, freckles, eyes—and smooth skin. Her voice, too, has a gentle, soothing cadence.
“He is well, Mistress Ballard,” she says. “Thank you for mending him. I don’t know what I would have”—her voice thickens with emotion—“what I would do without him.”
I set my hand on May’s shoulder and give her a pat. “He loves you too.
Never doubt that.”
“I couldn’t. Not if I tried.”
“Good day, both of you,” I say, and step out the door. As it closes behind me, I hear May introduce herself and then comes the usual response.
“You may call me Doctor.”
May Dawin is inside, whispering with Doctor, but Sam stands beside the wagon, running his big hand up and down the bridge of Brutus’s long, soft nose. He has never looked less pleased to see me.
