~Chapter 17~
Hannah was floored. When Margaret suggested that she take over the preparation of the food baskets, Hannah had never imagined that one person – especially her delicate daughter-in-law – could handle the daily strain of the task on top of household chores. Yet, Margaret pushed on day by day. Admittedly, Hannah noticed that Margaret seemed tired and sought her bed early each evening, but Hannah would never discourage such spirit; she sat back and watched in silence.
Five nights had passed by John's count and still his wife remained absent from their bed. John did not know what to make of it. He waited impatiently in his armchair, a book in hand but far from holding his attention, for his wife that he might have an answer from her.
Margaret knew that she had never before been this weary. Her head throbbed. Her bones and muscles ached. Even her skin protested this brutal schedule. And twice this day her hands had spasmed and she dropped the full baskets she held down the front stair. Perhaps worst of all, unseasonably cold weather had settled over Milton and Margaret could not get warm. Thus, when she entered the master bedroom just after supper, Margaret was appalled to find her husband out of bed with not so much as a wrap for warmth. "John," she scolded, gathering an afghan from the blanket chest at the foot of the bed, "Have you no care for your health? You are sure to take a chill."
"Margaret," John returned in confusion, "The day is quite warm." He took her hand to stop her from tucking the blanket around him and felt immediately the fevered warmth of her skin. "You are ill!" he exclaimed, terror sweeping through him. How could he have been so stupid as to return home to his wife when carrying the fever? He had known the danger and ignored it at the expense of his wife's health. John shook his head as though to clear the thoughts; they would do Margaret no good. At this moment, his job was to see his wife nursed through this illness, not to waste time blaming himself for actions already past. "Come," he commanded, and led Margaret by the hand that he still held across the room to their bed.
Surprised, Margaret did as she was bid. She stood quietly by the bed as John unfastened her dress and undergarments and then fetched a nightgown for her. At any other time, Margaret would have shivered deliciously at her husband's touch, but just now she could scarcely remain standing from exhaustion. So, once clothed in the simple white garment, she climbed gratefully under the navy coverlet and lay still as John tucked it in around her.
"Sleep," John urged, and left to find his mother.
Mrs. Thornton looked up from her sewing, expecting to see her daughter-in-law but instead found her son. "John," she scolded, "You should not have walked down the stairs unattended. Where is Margaret?"
"Hopefully asleep," John responded.
"Where?" Hannah returned.
"The master bedroom," John replied, not understanding why his mother needed to know. "Now mother-"
"That girl!" Hannah fumed, setting her needlework aside more emphatically than the action required. "I told her that staying in your room would disturb your rest and she still cares so little for me that she ignores my request!"
So, Margaret's absence from his bed had come at his mother's insistence; John ran a hand through his hair in frustration. He wondered how he had not considered that possibility. "Mother," he stated more loudly, folding his arms across his chest and letting the word hang in the air for a moment before continuing, "Margaret is ill. She has caught my fever. She is to remain in our bed and is to be disturbed for naught save meals. I am well. I have humored your nursemaid tendencies long enough. I will be making my own decisions as to my health from this point forward. Is this clear?"
Hannah had let her mouth hang open in surprise at her son's tone and words, but closed it with an audible clacking of teeth once she realized her expression. "Yes," she said and John quit the room to find Molly and Edward.
After speaking to the staff about the mistress' illness and her need for rest, John returned to his bedroom and found his Margaret sound asleep. She seemed so small and frail in the large bed, her flushed face contrasting sharply with the white pillow on which she lay. A hand to her forehead confirmed what that flush had already displayed, the fever still burned. Once he had changed for the night, John climbed into the bed beside his wife and gathered her close, finding no comfort in the action which he had so longed for these past five nights. His arms could not keep her safe. "Be well, Margaret," he begged, the words a desperate prayer, "Be well, my love."
The next morning, Margaret woke in her husband's arms. "Good morning," he offered, kissing her forehead, her eyelids, each flushed cheek, and then finding her lips.
She yawned, stretching and carefully erasing any signs of pain from her face as every muscle protested the movement. "You seem in a fine mood this day, husband," Margaret declared.
"Aye," John affirmed, "Your fever is lower and I am off to the mill to learn of our situation since my absence." Margaret's eyes widened at the last statement, so John hurriedly continued, "I will go only for some short hours, my love."
"Do not overstress yourself," Margaret warned and raised her head for the farewell kiss that John planted on her lips. She allowed her eyelids to slip closed as John moved about the room, drifting in and out of dreams. Once he quit the room after a final kiss, however, Margaret forced herself into a seated position. The workers' food baskets would not make themselves in her absence. She dressed slowly, pausing several times when merely the act of standing proved too difficult. Finally, Margaret made her way towards the stairs. She stood for a dizzy minute looking down what seemed an insurmountable distance and then began to carefully make her way down.
John chuckled to himself as he walked back up the steps to his house. He had left his lunch bag on the dining room table and now had the task of retrieving it, since his wife would not be doing so. Margaret. John sobered a bit at the thought. He would not truly breathe easy until she was completely well. Thank God that he had discovered her illness or she might have overworked herself and become even worse. He opened the front door and stepped into the hall. When his eyes adjusted from the bright light outside to the dim interior, he spotted Margaret frozen halfway down the stairs. "What are you doing out of bed?" he asked.
Margaret jerked her head up at her husband's voice. The movement caused the world to spin before her and she lost focus on remaining upright.
John watched in horror as his wife collapsed and tumbled down the stairs, landing in a crumpled heap at the bottom. He reached her in three strides, gathered her limp body into his arms, and yelled, "Mother!"
Hannah ran into the hall, "What is it? What has happened?"
"It is Margaret," John choked out, "She fell. Oh God. Fetch Molly and come to the master bedroom."
Hannah picked up her skirts and ran for the kitchen.
John tenderly lifted his wife and made his way back up the stairs and into their bedroom, placing her carefully onto the bed. Margaret's dark eyes fluttered and slowly opened.
Margaret regained consciousness, disconcerted for a moment at her changed location. "What happened?" she asked in confusion.
"You fell on the stairs," John explained, his brow furrowed in concern and his heart still beating wildly. "Can you move all of your fingers and toes? Does anything hurt?"
Margaret wiggled her appendages and then struggled to sit up, assuring her husband, "I am no more than bruised."
John stopped her rising with a hand. "Lay still, Margaret. Mother and Molly will soon be up to look you over."
"I do not require any doctoring," Margaret protested, coloring at the thought of an examination led by Mrs. Thornton.
"I only wish a true doctor could be had," John declared, "For if you do not require one, I do. My heart may never beat properly again. Whatever possessed you to come downstairs?"
Reminded of her duty, Margaret shot up into a seated position. "The food baskets! I must prepare food for the mill workers."
Walking into the master bedroom with Molly at her heels, Hannah could not believe her daughter-in-law's pigheadedness. "You will do no such thing," Hannah snapped. "Go now, John, and we will tend to her."
"I will be just outside," John assured his wife, who gave him a pleading look.
Hannah had Margaret stand with Molly's help and stripped her down to her undergarments. Thus attired, Margaret was subjected to a thorough exam that mostly consisted of Hannah and Molly poking and prodding at her to ensure that she had not broken anything. When they were finally satisfied that Margaret had indeed only bruised herself in the fall, Margaret was dressed in a nightgown and returned to the bed. Her worn out body took advantage of her prostrate position and pulled her quickly into sleep.
"Foolish girl, how could you act so thoughtlessly?" Hannah clucked as she fussed over the blankets. She paused and then somewhat grudgingly added, "You possess more strength and determination than I credit you with."
Just reaching unconsciousness as her mother-in-law spoke, Margaret did not hear her words of praise.
Hannah quit the master bedroom, closing the door behind her quietly, and turned to find John waiting anxiously. "She did not do herself any serious harm," Hannah assured him, placing her hand on his arm. Letting go of the breath that he held with a whoosh, John embraced his mother wordlessly and went to his wife. Hannah watched through the open doorway as her son pulled his chair to the bedside and sat watching Margaret sleep. She nodded, feeling for the first time acceptance of her diminished role in John's life; his wife would now come before his mother in his thoughts and actions. It should be so.
John stayed there watching over his wife for hours. When she woke, he called for a tray and watched over her as she consumed every morsel. She will be well, he promised himself. And she seemed to be for two days, as he patiently nursed her, fitting in work at the mill when she slept. On the third day, he woke in the early pre-dawn hours when he was accustomed to rising and felt her burning skin against his own. The fever had worsened and her teeth chattered terribly when he placed a wet cloth on her forehead. Even more frighteningly, she begged for Dixon to remove it. John summoned Edward to wake his mother and to fetch Molly; he paced while he waited for help to arrive.
They tried bleeding her, spooning herbal remedies and even Molly's concoction into Margaret. She did not respond to treatment. Instead, the fever grew higher and her lips dried and cracked and she continued to speak to absent and dead family and friends. John Thornton would not leave her side.
"You are needed at the mill," Hannah pleaded multiple times, thinking that he needed the mill more than it needed him. She feared what the loss of Margaret would do to her son. "I will care for her," Hannah bargained.
"Damn the mill!" was John's response.
In private moments at his wife's bedside, John begged her to stay. He professed his love a thousand times and held her limp form in his arms, stroking her chestnut brown hair. At times she was agitated and John would speak to her soothingly. He hated to see her so. Yet, when she seemed more quiet, lay more still, appeared closer to death, he would grow desperate and shake her roughly. "Damn it, Margaret!" he raged in such times, "Fight for us! For what we are! For what we could be!" Still, she did not know him.
Finally, though, the fever weakened and left her. After finding his wife resting peacefully with no unnatural blush or heat to her face, John dragged his mother into the room to confirm this. "She is out of danger," Hannah pronounced. John sagged visibly in relief, finding that exhaustion slipped easily into the place of anxiousness. "Sleep, John," his worried mother commanded, "I will stay with her." John rose, kissed his wife's forehead, reveling in its temperature, and then squeezed his mother's hand in thanks as he quit the room. He fell atop the coverlet in the guest room beside the master bedroom and slept soundly for eleven hours.
Thus, when Margaret managed to lift her heavy eyelids, shocked by her own weakness, she found Mrs. Hannah Thornton at her bedside. Margaret attempted to feign sleep, but Hannah had seen her daughter-in-law's eyes struggle open.
"You've frightened my boy near to death with this illness," Hannah started.
Margaret kept her eyes closed, unable to flee in any other way from the cruelty that she knew would follow.
"I must say," Hannah continued. "I did fear that you would leave us and that some of my last words to you would have been spoken in rebuke."
"Last words?" Margaret burst out, rising with considerable difficulty into a seated position, "Every word you have spoken to me has been spoken in rebuke or anger. You make me an unwanted guest and I cannot remove myself." She collapsed back onto the pillows, her little strength spent and her entire body trembling from the effort.
"You should not upset yourself," Hannah cautioned, fearful of Margaret relapsing. "I will go now." Margaret tried to turn her back on her mother-in-law but was too weary and instead settled on turning her face away.
When John woke, he immediately went to his wife and found his mother seated in a chair outside the door. "Mother," he asked, "Why are you not in with Margaret?"
"She was agitated," Hannah explained, "I felt it best for her to be calm."
John nodded curtly and entered the room. Margaret lay so still as quiet that John pressed a hand anxiously to her forehead to assure himself that the fever had not returned. He sat with his wife for four hours but when she did not so much as stir, he called Hannah to sit with her while he worked on some dreadfully neglected account books.
At the mill, John found Williams overwhelmed by the business of running the mill in his absence and exhausted by his efforts. John resolved to return to his normal working hours now that Margaret had recovered so as to avoid losing his man to either illness or exhaustion. When he returned from the mill that night, Margaret still slept. She had woken once briefly but pretended sleep at the sight of Mrs. Thornton again at her bedside and Hannah had allowed it.
Over the next two weeks, Margaret slowly grew stronger, fighting her limits and pushing to recover and escape that room and Mrs. Thornton's almost constant company. Somehow, John never managed to see Margaret during waking hours, yet he delighted in his mother's reports of progress. He sat beside his wife at night and whispered words of love when the sight of her loveliness and most importantly her improved health did not overwhelm him with emotion.
One morning, waking to find Mrs. Thornton absent, Margaret entreated Molly, who came with a breakfast tray, to draw her a bath. Margaret was still unsteady on her feet and unable to remain out of bed for more than a few minutes, but she longed for that soapy clean feeling and an opportunity to untangle her matted hair. Besides, she had felt a strange cramp in her stomach upon waking and hoped that the warm water would soothe it. She stood as Molly pulled the nightgown over her head and then dropped back to the bed panting.
"Are ya' all right, mistress?" Molly asked, "Sure and the master will have m'head when he hears that I 'llowed this."
"I am fine and the master need not hear of this," Margaret responded, unwilling to turn back now that the temptation of the hot bath lay before her. It is only four, at most five, steps away, she informed her unsteady legs. One, two, three, four, five. She hurried across the distance, with Molly's arm for balance, and carefully lowered herself into the blissful water. It was heaven.
Before long, however, Margaret had to acknowledge her mistake. She lifted trembling limbs for Molly to scrub, sometimes so weak that she had to lower the arm or leg several times before it was clean, despite Molly's quick hands. After every inch of her body had been scrubbed and her hair thoroughly washed and rinsed, Margaret lounged in the cooling water, unwilling to face the reality that she would never make the trip from tub to bed. Why, she was not certain that she could even stand long enough to be dried. I am stronger than I know, Margaret assured herself and then rose. "Dry me quickly," she instructed Molly.
Molly hurried to comply, thinking how suddenly pale the mistress looked.
Despite Molly's best efforts, Margaret's legs trembled and then a twist of sharp pain in her stomach caused them to fail her. She landed on her knees still inside the copper tub and gripped the edge with white fingers to stop from crying out at the pain.
Molly shrieked, her dark eyes wide in fear, and then cried, "I must go for the master!"
"No!" Margaret demanded, "Fetch Mrs. Thornton." Better Mrs. Thornton than John see her in pain. Mrs. Thornton would have words with her over this in any account; it may as well be now.
"Mrs. Thornton is from the house," Molly responded.
Margaret let out a loud breath. "Then give me a towel and go for the master," she finally stated, resigned.
John sat in his office going over the numbers and worrying that he would lose yet another customer due to his decreased work force. He had always possessed a head for numbers, but no one could balance the books of Marlboro Mills in their present state. Behind him, he heard footsteps heavy on the stairs and then the door opening violently behind him. "What is it?" John asked, sure that Williams came to report yet another catastrophe, as seemed routine of late.
"Please, sir," Molly's voice entreated. John turned at the sound and saw the terror in her face as she continued. "It's the mistress."
John's throat twisted and he shoved away his accounts and rose in haste. "Where?" he growled.
"The bedroom," Molly replied, "she -"
But he was gone, rushing past her down the stairs and crossing the yard in six steps before breaking into a run as he reached the house. John entered the bedroom still in a sprint, freezing at the sight of Margaret trembling in fatigue, pain, and chill, trying modestly to cover herself while still kneeling in the tub.
"What are you doing?" he burst, "You are sure to become ill from this long exposure." He scooped her up in his arms, mindless of his suit, which became drenched in the process. Instead of depositing her on the bed as Margaret had hoped, John carried her to a chair beside the fireplace, built up the fire, and moved her chair still closer to warm her.
Margaret sat, trying to appreciate the heat and to ignore the pain in her core that throbbed its way to the center of her attention. She smiled when upon opening her eyes she found her husband kneeling by her side and watching her face with his brow furrowed with worry.
"I had started to think you did not exist," she offered, comforted by his presence.
"Nay," John returned, "It is I who wondered after all these days if a kiss was needed to wake the sleeping beauty."
Margaret lowered her eyes and bit her lip, pretending shyness at her husband's attention. She hoped to distract him from her increasing pain.
"You are mostly dry, my love," John noticed. "Shall I help you into bed?"
"Aye," Margaret answered.
John brought a nightgown and began to slip it over his wife's arms and head. He caught his breath at the sight of her nakedness as the towel fell away, but allowed the cloth in his hands to cover her. With careful movements, he freed her damp hair from the collar, running his fingers through the thick locks. His pulse pounded in his ears. It had been quite some time. John lifted his wife into his arms and stopped. A red stain darkened the portion of the white towel on which Margaret had been seated.
"You are bleeding!"
Margaret looked down and spotted the towel. "It is nothing," she assured him. "It must be my monthly time."