Between the Raindrops

When You Move, I'm Moved

Payne looked at him sympathetically. "Suffragette?"

Arthur blinked. "Uh, sure. Somethin' like that."

He followed his lady into this fine warm home, like a wolf invited amongst the flock, and a deplorable part of him noted the simplicity of the lock and the well-appointed dining room, with the carved sideboard and china cabinet. The fine white plates all round and cool like little moons and the silver chest that could fit under his arm...

No. Not these folks.

A woman screamed from a room deeper in the home and Arthur froze, his head snapping toward the sound, trying to assess the threat, and knowing, preternaturally that he could be of little help here. Silence settled back over the house and he noted the ticking of a clock under the hushed tones of the women. Emelia spoke with an older woman, a shriveled little prune wrapped in a green flannel shawl. The midwife, he assumed. Her voice like a brook over river stones, cool, bubbly and soothing despite the fear in that cry from beyond.

Emelia paused to look at him, a lone man standing so lost in the expanse, at a time ruled rightly by women. He remembered when Abigail's time had come. John was falling down drunk and Grimshaw cursed him a fool and a child and sent Arthur. He rode to Thistledown in the black of night. Rode like one of the Four Horsemen at a deadly breakneck pace, Boadicea lathered in sweat. Arthur drew the midwife from her home with threats and bribery and pleading.

"On the table, Mr. Morgan," Emelia motioned, in indication of where to go. "Please."

He nodded, stepping forward, his boots sounding heavy on the planks. Venturing deeper into the home, into the kitchen beyond the two women. A squared pine table sat in the center of kitchen tiles, draped in cloth. Next to the great cast-iron stove, pots set to boiling. The mid-wife had been heating plates too, placing them in a basket, keeping the sheets warm.

Arthur set the bags down, mindful of the fragile contents. "Thank you," Emelia said softly. Her continued politeness to him only left him feeling more wretched. He looked at her, in her soft lace chemise. Already she rolled up her sleeves. "You gonna be alright," he asked.

A tiny smile flickered at the edge of her mouth and disappeared just as quick. "Yes, Arthur. Thank you."

"I'll just, uh, see to the girls," he said. Emelia nodded and with a tip of his hat, Arthur retreated to the relative safety of the cool outdoors.

"I can't stand the sound of it either," Mr. Payne confided from his chair. Arthur looked at him and found the older man staring out over the farm, almost in a daze. "It's somethin', ain't it?"

"What?"

"Kids. You wanna protect 'em from every scrape and danger... but... well. I can't help this."

"Livin' is messy," Arthur agreed.

"Damn fools," Payne continued. "They were so proud of it. That damn star."

"Yer son-in-law? He was a sheriff?"

"Deputy," Mr. Payne nodded. "Shot over an empty wagon."

"I'm sorry," Arthur managed. "For your girl. Must be tough."

"Young'uns. They all think themselves invincible. Thought 'cause he could shoot a beer bottle off a fence post he was special."

Arthur stayed out by the horse shed, watering the mares. A farmhand graciously offered some oats and directed him to a pasture. Once Boadicea and Belladonna were comfortably at rest, he pulled his journal and a strip of dried venison form his satchel and settled against the wall. Leafing through the pages. Past the sketch of a pretty girl leaning hazardously from a ladder, or the one of her nestled in a plethora of poppies.