The Valley: A Novel Excerpt

“Old Zaida! Zaida, are you awake? Old Zaida!”

There was the sound of boy’s fists on the closed door, and the high thin tension of his child’s voice in the darkness.

Within there was no response.

“Old Zaida! Please wake up.”

There was urgency in the plea, and strangeness too in its mingling with the night wind. Another frantic pounding on the rough door and this time there was a sound inside.

“Eh law, who is it?” the impatient voice rasped, relieving the lonesome call of the child outside.

“It’s Paul Williams, from down in Thickety. Pa said I should come and fetch you. Ma’s time’s come.”

There was the sharp scratch of a match along the hearth and a dim light glowed through the window. Presently the door opened and the old woman stood there in the shadows with the lamplight falling behind her. Her full unbleached domestic nightgown filled the entrance and thin grey hair hung loose about her neck. She motioned the boy inside and began to gather her articles of midwifery. Meanwhile she talked, sounding as an owl might have sounded in the dismal night-dark room.

“So you’re Paul, eh? You’re the last one I helped bring in at your ma’s. Or was it next to last?”

“Next to last,” Paul said with a blushing shame at the information. “My sister Opal, she’s the least one.”

“That’s it. Opal. I recollect now you name it. Turn your head a minute.”

And when she spoke again they were ready to go, except for tying the heavy men’s shoes she always wore.

Outside the air smelled fresh and filled with fruitfulness compared to the stale musty odor of sleep within old Zaida’s room. Paul stood and waited on the step while she blew out the lamp and closed the door behind them.

“I can’t hardly find the path,” the boy said, when they were walking along the edge of the mountain.

“It’s just before morning,” the old woman muttered, “and that’s always the darkest time of night. Here, let me go ahead of you.”

So she led the way through the cleared space, between the trees in the woods and along the ridge of a small hill. The stars were pale in the sky and a light morning wind stroked past their faces—the warm damp wind of spring. A fluttering of bird’s wings stirred in the trees above them, and the moment seemed suspended between darkness and light.

The boy and woman moved on, bound by their single purposeness, until they came to the grey shape of a house set in an open space at the foot of a hill. Behind the hill was another dip in the earth, making a narrow little valley which rose in turn to a mountain.

At the broken gate, Paul and Zaida turned in, following the light from the window.

In the kitchen, John Williams stood helpless with his sleepy children around him. Relief shone in his eyes at the entrance of the midwife.

“She’s in there,” he said, nodding toward the bedroom.

“I ought to know where she’d be. Now get some pans of water on the stove here,” Zaida commanded. One of the girls moved to obey and the old woman thrust the brown paper bag she had brought into her hands. “Take my things in yonder, Ivy. It’s herbs. I thought I might need to brew your ma something before the morning was over. You, Ruby and Paul, fetch the water now and mend the fire.”

So all was activity in the kitchen, each one moving under the sharp tongue and quick eye of the noisome woman. That is, all except the man who stood ineffectual in the midst of the bustle, staring vacantly into the smoky flame of the lamp. Presently he spoke to the girl beside the stove.

“Have you got anything in the warmer, Ivy? I’d better get on to the plowing.”

“There’s some biscuits I can warm up.”

She fried a...