Page from a Tennessee Journal (AmazonEncore Edition)

hands flying like they were thirty years younger, Becky opened jars and began mixing ointments, salves, and foul-smelling liquids on the upturned lid of one Mason jar. With her quick fingers, she dabbed Annalaura’s cuts. Auntie opened another jar and poured a small amount of honey-thick unguent into the palm of one hand. She rubbed her hands together and patted the lotion all over Annalaura’s bruised and battered places.
    “Don’t look like he touched the chil’ren, praise the Lawd. Bad business when a white man beat on you. If he gets mad ’nough, he takes it out on the whole family. Gal, did you tell him no when you shoulda said yes?” Becky’s hands skimmed over Annalaura’s lower body. “Ain’t nothin’ broke.” Her inspection done, she sat on the bed beside her niece.
    Whatever her aunt had doused over her started its work. Annalaura let her heavy eyelids close. Becky’s fuzzy words swept in and out of her ears. Annalaura struggled to ease herself up in the bed. This was not the time to give in to sleep. She pushed away the damp cloth Becky tapped over her eyes.
    “White man?” Her aunt’s words registered in her head. “No. Alex ain’t never hit me. John…” She fell back onto Becky’s feather pillow.
    “Say what? If it wasn’t McNaughton, who was…?”
    “God help me, Aunt Becky. John, he’s back.” She could feel her tongue swell in her mouth.
    “What you sayin’? John Welles is back, and he done found you like this?” Becky pressed open the tin box and took out a pinch of dried leaves. She dipped them in a fresh-poured cup of water and lifted the scruffy enameled container to Annalaura’s lips. The elixir poured over Annalaura’s chin, and down the front of her dress. She lifted a hand to right the cup.
    “I ain’t told him who it was.” Annalaura managed a sip just as another pain gripped her midsection.
    “John’s back, Lawd Almighty. It’s troubles. Troubles.” Becky closed her eyes and began to rock on the bed.
    In a voice so tiny it could barely be heard, the old Cherokee began to mutter words that Annalaura knew weren’t English. Annalaura propped herself on the pillow and raised her voice as loud as she could muster.
    “John. He don’t know ’bout the father.”
    “Hard to keep a man from knowin’ who the daddy. When a man think it ain’t him, he gonna worry everybody ’til he finds out who. Old Ben Thornton, he knew ’bout Johnny.” Becky’s eyes refocused on Annalaura’s face. She reached over again and wet the cloth in the tea mixture and laid it over her niece’s eyes.
    “The hired man. I told John it was the hired man.” Annalaura felt Becky press gently down on the wet cloth, and its coolness soothed her.
    “Hmm. Hired man, you say? That’s good ’nough fo’ a beatin’ but not a killin’.” Becky kept the cloth over Annalaura’s face. “How long ’til yo’ John find this hired man, and the truth?” She pulled the cloth away.
    “I pray to God he don’t never find out. I hear Isaiah gone home to Kentucky.” Another pain wracked her, and she rolled to her side and drew up her knees.
    “You’d better be hopin’ that baby ain’t comin’. That them pains is just from the blow he put on you.” Becky handed the blue enameled cup to her niece as she moved toward the kitchen safe.
    Annalaura heard her aunt rummaging through the drawers and shelves. Becky returned to stand over the bed.
    “I’m goin’ to Hettie’s. Takin’ the children with me,” Becky announced.
    “The children?” Annalaura’s heart thumped through her sore ribs. “You can’t take them to Hettie. Mr. Ben Roy will ask what they doin’ there. You knows Mr. Ben Roy’s a beatin’ man. He’ll make Hettie or the children tell him. If he finds out John’s back with a pistol…” Annalaura grabbed the cloth and laid it tight over her forehead.
    “Ben Roy?” Becky let a little smile creep across her face when Annalaura slid the cloth up her forehead to peek at her aunt. “Ain’t no need to be ’fraid of Ben Roy. I still got the paper hid real good.”
    A new shot of fear filled Annalaura. “Aunt Becky. I can’t have my children with Hettie if Mr. Ben Roy is at her cabin. It won’t take nothin’ but a minute fo’ him to find out ’bout…’bout…”
    Rebecca’s eyes began their backward shift to that other place where her mind sometimes dwelled.
    “I done tole you, don’t worry none ’bout Ben Roy Thornton. I gots the paper hid real