Joseph!
Dawson!
The glass!
Fogarty!
Thomas!
Her voice was a few steps behind her foggy mind. Thankfully, she was not alone.
“Well now. Did you have a good nap, young lady?”
As her eyes began to focus, Fogarty came into view. He sat across the table from her, in Joseph’s seat, with her happy sohn in his lap. Thomas, however, was nowhere to be seen.
“Mr. Fogarty, danke,” she tried to stand. Her legs refused to allow it. She sank back into the chair. “I hope he has not been too much trouble for you.”
“Quite the contrary. In my younger days, I went down Virginia way and fell in love with a pretty little lass named Julie Ann. Made her my wife, and life led us to Louisiana. She left this world before me, but not before she gave me two sons and a daughter.” His eyes sparkled in the candlelight. “We relocated here and there. Louisiana to Minnesota and everywhere in between.”
“What took you so many places?”
“Many reasons really. But the most notable of them all?” Fogarty chuckled. “Baseball.”
Rebekah wrinkled her nose. “Baseball?”
He nodded. “1876-1880. Cincinnati Reds.”
Rebekah’s tired eyes widened. “Is that so?”
“You are looking at their center fielder until a head injury took me out of the lineup. Not too terribly long after that, I moved to Minnesota and learned to barber.” He sighed. “Now, I am an old man and miss my grandchildren a great deal. So being here this afternoon has been as much of a blessing to me as it was for you and Joseph.”
“Joseph,” she began but was interrupted by a yawn. When the yawn finished, so did she with her spoken thought. “How is he? And how is Thomas?”
Fogarty stood up. “How about you come see for yourself?”
Slowly, Rebekah followed Fogarty up the stairs to the bedroom she shared with Joseph. There he lay, like a corpse, in the bed they shared. Their quilt was pulled up to his chin, revealing only a taste of the horrors it covered. His head, bandaged, and his face, ashen. A chair sat at the head of the bed with a sleeping Thomas holding it down.
“He has not left Joseph’s side for more than a minute or two at a time since I brought him up,” Fogarty said. “Said he promised you he would look after him and, as he said, he was a man of his word.” Fogarty chuckled. “And quite a little man he is.”
“Jah, jah he is.” A smile flickered across her lips as her heart swelled with pride for her little brudder as he grew into the man he was becoming but flitted away as her gaze fell to Joseph. “May I go see him?”
“Of course. He is all yours.”
Rebekah stepped across the room to Joseph’s side. “What was wrong with his legs?”
Ever patient, Fogarty fielded question after question as he had no doubt fielded fly balls so many years ago. He explained how, in tornadoes as he called them, wind blew pieces of debris so hard and so fast that they sometimes impaled people without them knowing, and even without them feeling it. There would usually be little to no blood loss and injuries could be incredibly severe. Luckily, Joseph’s was not. It was simply a scrap piece of a wagon wheel that was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“Or the right place,” Rebekah said. “If it had hit somewhere else, he may have been hurt worse. Or even killed.”
Fogarty smiled and bounced Dawson on his hip. “I suppose that’s the difference in faith and, well, me.”
Rebekah paused in her checking-over of her husband and glanced up at the old barber. “What do you mean?”
Fogarty ignored her innocent question. “Here. Your baby has been missing his mother.”
Rebekah accepted him with a smile. “Thank you for taking care of everything here today, in our hour of need. When we needed help the most.”
“You are most certainly welcome.”
Rebekah thought for a moment. “Some might call that divine intervention.”
Again, Fogarty ignored her.
Unfazed, Rebekah filled the silence with a burning question. “How is my Fater, Mr. Fogarty? And how is my husband?”
Fogarty ducked his head. “Your father is very ill. I believe he has a blood clotting disorder. I have seen it before.” He scratched his nose. “There is a chance he may not wake up. And if he does wake up, Rebekah, there is a chance this will keep happening, again and again, until it ultimately takes his life.”
Rebekah’s throat tightened. “Oh no.” Emotion clogged her throat.
“The report on Joseph is not much sunnier, I am afraid.” He stared at Rebekah until she met his gaze. “In addition to his leg injuries, Joseph was kicked in the head. He has suffered a major head injury. He has been unconscious since I arrived, and to hear Thomas’s report, since you found him. He was bleeding from the head, and the skull appears to be fractured though it is impossible to know how bad without the possibility of making it worse.”
“But he is alive now,” Rebekah ventured.
“Yes. Barely.” Fogarty turned toward the door. “Do you know how to care for him?”
Rebekah paused. She had never had to care for an invalid before, only infants. And Joseph was certainly no infant. “I suppose I had not really thought about it.”
“You will need to feed him his meals, make them liquid as best you can. Get him to drink as much as you can. If you can.”
Rebekah nodded as she followed Fogarty out of the bedroom and down the stairs.
“He will not be able to use the facilities to relieve himself. You will have to be mindful of his bowel and bladder habits and clean him when they occur. Change his clothes daily, and the sheets, too, along with the bandages on both legs and his head. Be mindful of his head wound that you do not make it worse.”
Rebekah’s head was spinning by the time they arrived at the front door.
“It will be hard work,” Fogarty said, “but I think you are up to the task. I have never seen such…”
He thought for a moment.
“Such ingenious measures taken to try and save somebody’s life.” Fogarty’s lips pulled up into a grandfatherly smile. “If he wants to live as much as you obviously want him to, the odds are in his favor.”
Finally, Rebekah found her words. “Thank you, Mr. Fogarty. Once I get things under control here, I will be in a position where I can pay you for your efforts.”
“Not necessary.” He turned and walked off the porch and into the night. “Oh, and Dawson, Thomas, and I cleaned up the glass in the living room. Covered the windows. And put the door back on, as well.” Fogarty lifted his hat in the moonlight. “Remember if you need anything at all, just send word. This old man will just be down the road.”
Chapter Eight
Rebekah stood in the doorway and watched as Fogarty walked across the yard and into the night. Without warning, Thomas appeared at her side.
