“Can you tell me where the pain is?” Ma asked Pete.

While Pete talked with her, haltingly, Ma prepared a warm poultice to place on his belly. “I feel… swollen… in my belly,” Pete gasped out, “but I feel flat, too.”

Ma encouraged him to rest and gently felt his belly. Pete choked and Ma lifted him slightly sose nothing went down into his lungs. Pete turned his head to the side and blood trickled out of his mouth. She wiped his mouth and said, “Well, Pete, would you like a little shine to take off some of the pain?”

“Yes, I would….It’s a mite painful.”

Ma lifted his head and gave him a sip of moonshine. His features relaxed slightly and Pete mouthed, “Thanks.”

Lucy gave him a little more moonshine. She wasn’t a doctor, so she had nothing else to offer him for pain. Pete fell asleep and Lucy asked everyone to be as quiet as they possibly could to give him this momentary pain free sleep. She placed another pillow under his head and turned it to the side so he wouldn’t choke and place the warm compress on his swollen, feverish belly.

“Mildred, can we go out to the porch swing and have a cup of coffee?”

Mildred jumped up and met Lucy outside with 2 steaming cups of coffee. She handed Lucy a cup of coffee and said as she sat down by Lucy, “How bad is it Lucy? Can he come back from this?”

This was Lucy’s least favorite part of doctoring and she would just as soon leave it out altogether, but she loved her mountain friends and would bring them whatever comfort she could. “Do you mind if we say a word of prayer, Mildred? Dear Lord, we come to you with sorrow of heart but faith in You. Please smile on Pete and bring his health back, if it be your will and bless our time to talk. Mildred, I will give it to you straight. He’s a dyin. If’n he stays here in his own house, he will die. The other alternative is takin him into town to the hospital. I don’t know if Pete can live through the jostlin of the dirt roads into town. He might die on the way or he might make it to the hospital and then die…or live. He has messed up innards and I don’t know, but they might be able to fix him up. You have a really big decision to make.”

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Mildred was softly weeping. “What would you do, Lucy? I just don’t know what to do. He’s my man and I don’t want to see him suffering or leaving me. He is such a healthy man, it’s hard to see him weak.”

Lucy said, “Mildred, I don’t know what I would do in your situation. I think when he wakes up, you should both talk about it and make your decision together as soon as possible. Do you have a place where Karen and Hattie could bed down for the night? They have their own blankets and such. I need to get back to Pete and change his compress.”

Mildred said with tears in her eyes, “I’ll get the girls taken care of. Will you call me when he wakes up?”

“Of course,” Lucy said, with an empathy only a mother and wife could have.

Lucy checked on Pete, changing his compress, pacing a wet rag on his head and wiping his mouth. There wasn’t much she could do and it made her feel really frustrated. She consoled herself by realizing even a college educated doctor couldn’t do anything more in this situation, with all of his high falutin education. It helped a little, but it didn’t make her friend any better.

Pete stirred, moaning. Lucy asked Mildred for a cup of hot water and put some white willow bark in it. This had the properties of aspirin and could help some with the aches and might take some of the swelling down. When he opened his eyes, she started spooning little sips of the tea into his mouth. “That moonshine took away some of the pain, sose I could think a little more sensibly. I thank you fur that,” Pete said.

Mildred heard him whispering and came into the room. She sat down beside him and asked how he was doin. “I feel a mite better.”

“We need to talk, Pete. We have to make an important decision,” Mildred said to him. She proceeded to relate what Lucy had told her.