“Just take your time, that's all I say. I don't have anything against the boy, one way or the other. I'm just not any hurry to lose my only daughter.”
“I do promise I will take my time, and I am in no rush to get married.”
“Good girl. Now where are the boys? We have work to get done and the hands have already started.”
No sooner had he said this than the two in question stumbled sleepily into the kitchen and took their places at the table.
“Good morning sleepy heads.” Lilly greeted her sons Tommy and Jacob. Tommy looked a great deal like her with his pale blonde hair and blue eyes. He had just turned a gangly seventeen. Jacob was nearer to his father in looks and was the baby of the family. He was nine years old and growing like a weed. The boys answered in unison as they took their chairs.
“Morning, Mama.”
“Didn't, think you boys would ever get up this morning. Why the hands have been working for hours I think.”
“Sorry Papa. I was up late watching the men bring in the corn from the south parcel. We'll be working the middle parcel today I take it?” Tommy queried, diving hungrily into his breakfast.
“Sure will, now eat up, and let us be getting on with the day.”
After breakfast, Jessica began clearing the table and getting the dishes washed and put away. When she opened the back door to shake the crumbs from the tablecloth, a chill wind struck her face, and she shivered as though a cold hand had struck her. She quickly closed the door and began putting away the last of the dishes. Lilly came back into the kitchen and sat down at the table. Jessica turned to speak to her when suddenly Lilly bent over and moaned. Jessica dropped the dish in her hand and rushed to her mother, kneeling down beside her, noting how pasty white she looked. She cried, “Mama, what is wrong? It isn't time for you to go into labor yet, what is it?”As she questioned her mother Jessica looked down, saw the crimson stain spreading across the floor beneath the chair, and was on her feet and out the door screaming for Papa before she even realized that she had moved.
She rushed back to her Mama's side and pleaded with her, “Mama, please. Tell me what is wrong. Oh Please, please tell me how to help you Mama. You know I have only helped deliver two babies.”
Seeing that Lilly was unable to answer her questions, Jessica got her out of the chair and gently laid her on the floor. Saying a silent prayer over and over in her mind she ran for a comforter and pillow. She was still praying and hoping that she could help her mother through whatever was to come when she heard her father's footstep on the porch. John entered the kitchen, took one look at his wife and carefully lifted her into his arms and carried her across the sitting room into the bedroom. When he gently lowered her to the bed he turned, his face white and grim, and yelled for his eldest son to ride to the Bidwell farm and see if Doc Hansen was there and if not to find him wherever he was. Tommy hesitated at the bedroom doorway his eyes wide with fear as he looked at his Mama lying so pale and still on the bed. John exploded, bellowing like never before, “ride boy! Now! Ride like you have never ridden before and get that doctor here!”
Tommy raced from the house, and was quickly on a horse and flying out of the yard. He rode like he had devils chasing him, his face pale and fear showing wild in his eyes. His chest was heaving and tears rolling down his face as he prayed aloud, “oh please God, not my Mama! You gotta make her alright. Please God, don't let my Mama die.” He prayed over and over, too frightened to realize what he was saying, or that he was screaming it aloud as he rode.
John felt utterly helpless as he looked down at his wife. He felt as though a great weight was crushing down on him, crushing his world, because Lilly was his world. She had been his world for over twenty wonderful years now.
Frozen with fear, Jessica stood in the doorway watching the scene, as though she were removed from it. She jumped as if a shot had sounded when her Papa yelled at her. “Help me Jessica, help me, we have to do something for her! You, you’ve helped deliver more than one baby around here. Now, help me, I don't know how to help her, what I need to do!”
The agony in his voice broke through to Jessica's panic filled thoughts. She stumbled into the room, and to the bed where her Mama was beginning to moan. If possible, she looked even paler than she had before, with a blue tinge to her lips. Pain must be wracking her body because she was starting to moan and writhe on the bed Oh God, Jessica thought, looking at the blood staining the bed. How can anyone lose so much blood and still be alive? The thought had only barely formed in her mind when the full horror of what was happening struck Jessica like a blow. Her Mama was not going to live. She was dying right before their eyes. She quickly removed Lilly's clothing and covered her in blankets because she was shaking with chills now. She examined her enough to know a hemorrhage of this magnitude was far beyond any nursing skills she might possess, but still she kept trying... trying to do anything that might help. Anything that might save a life that was as dear to her as her own.
She could not stop the hemorrhage and despite some feeble contractions, there was not enough strength in Lilly to bring the child into the world. This birth was all wrong, there wasn't even any dilation. Finally, in desperation, Jessica attempted to deliver the child as she had seen the Doctor do on another occasion. It did not take her long to realize this was not going to prove successful either, and she rose wiping the blood from her hands and arms. Finally, in total despair she knelt beside the bed, and did the only thing that seemed left for her to do. She prayed, tears streaming down her young face and the heartache showing on her delicate features as she looked at her Mama, knew she was losing her, and felt an agony like she had never known existed.
Later that afternoon Doc Hansen stepped from the bedroom and faced Lillian's family. He was a caring man and this part of his work as a doctor was one that he detested and dreaded. He was going to have to tell this man and these three children, that a woman, they all loved so dearly was no more. Lying in the bedroom he had just left was a beautiful gentle and loving woman, not yet in her prime. Her life cruelly taken from her, when she had not yet seen her thirty-ninth year. He faced John.
“I'm sorry John. Nothing I could do, and even if I had been here when it happened, it would have been too late. I am so very sorry.”
John looked at him in disbelief, and, with a hideous bellow of, “NO!” He bolted from his chair and through the bedroom door. Following the slamming of the door, they heard his full anguish as his pathetic cries echoed through the silent house. “No, Lilly, no, not you, no, not my little Lilly, oh no. Noooo.”
Tommy and Jacob sat next to Jessica, and all three held each other in a fierce grip. Trying to comfort and be comforted but finding none in their shared grief. The sounds of the terrible pain they heard coming from their Papa breaking their hearts all the more. Jessica knew, as she looked at the bedroom door, that nothing would ever be the same again. Huge, hot tears streamed down her face as her mind grasped this thought and her grief welled anew.
Throughout the valley that night, many folks, the Ferrall household included, could have sworn they heard the screams of a mighty cat. The screams brought many residents upright in their beds and sent cold chills shivering down their spines. However, not much was said about this because everyone knew that no mountain lions had been around the area in many, many years.
CHAPTER TWO
Winter Woman stirred the embers of the fire and added a few sticks of wood. She pulled her fur robes around her and sat staring into the flames. Another dream. This one she knew had a special meaning. She pondered all that this one could mean but Winter Woman sensed without knowing how, that this dream did not mean something to only her people, this one directly involved her, and of this, she was certain.
She recalled her Grandfather with his sparkling green eyes and ready laughter. At first, her Grandmother had merely been his woman as was the way with so many of the white trappers, but her Grandfather loved her too dearly to let it rest at that. He married her Grandmother not only in the custom of her people but in the way of his people as well, as if to insure