Anne McCaffrey - If Wishes Were Horses

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OF COURSE, MANY PEOPLE in our small county village sought advice and help from my mother long

before the War started because she was quite wise as well as gifted with a healing touch. Often, day and

night, we would hear the front door knocker—shaped like a wyvern it was, with a stout curled

tail—bang against the brass sounding circle. That summons was undeniable, echoing through the Great

Hall and up the stairs. There was no sleeping once someone started pounding. Sometimes they didn't

pound but tapped, quietly but insistently, so that one was awakened more by the muted repetition than

the noise. From the time I was twelve, I got roused quite as often as my mother did. Of course, I was

also able to turn over and go back to sleep, which my mother could not.

"Those of us who can help should not deny it to others," my mother was apt to say, usually to still my

father's grumblings. "I'll just see what I can do for them."

"Day and night?" my father would demand in an exasperated or frustrated tone of voice.

However, he was such a heavy sleeper that he was rarely disturbed when she slipped from the huge oak

four-poster bed to answer the summons. As I grew older and she began to rely on me to assist her from

time to time, I realized that he never answered the nocturnal rapping, though occasionally Mother would

send me to wake him to help us. What I never did figure out—then—was how she knew, on our way

down the main staircase, that she would need his protection to answer that particular summons.

"Oh, it's nothing mysterious, Tirza love," Mother told me. "If you listen, you'll learn quick enough the

difference in the sound of the knocking. That can tell me a lot."

It took me nearly two years before I could differentiate between the hysterical, the urgent, or the merely

anxious kind of rapping.

Mother's ability to have some sort of a solution to almost any problem had become somewhat legendary

in our part of the Principality. She had a fund of general knowledge, an unfailing sympathy augmented by

common sense, and a remarkable healing touch.

"Much of the time, Tirza, they only need someone who listens, and they end up knowing their own

solutions. You may well have inherited the family failing, love," she went on with a sigh. When she saw

my stunned expression, she had added cheerfully, "But we won't know that for a while yet. Oh, it could

be worse, know. You could have inherited Aunt Simona's teeth."

That was quite enough to send me into the giggles.

"Oh, I am terrible!" And she rolled her eyes in mock-penitence. "However could I be so unkind as to

mention Aunt Simona's teeth! I may have no jam with tea tonight." Her lovely eyes twinkled. "Now do be

a good child and get me some clean bottles for this lotion I've just made for Mistress Chandler."

Nonetheless, I never heard anyone, not even Father, refer to Mother's ministrations as failings. Except

perhaps Aunt Simona, who had more than large, protruding front teeth to make her unlovable. Mother

also had an unerring ability to know who was speaking from the heart, telling the truth, and who might be

unwilling to own up to the consequences of his or her actions. Father would invariably delay his

magisterial sittings until she could join him, though her participation was confined to sitting quietly at one

end of the table. Strangers would try to prevaricate or settle blame elsewhere, but she was never

deceived in any particular. She and Father must have worked out some sort of private signals, for she

never spoke at these sessions, merely listened. Father was the one who pounced on the culprit and

would be in possession of details that would stun the miscreant, often into a terrified and more accurate

account of what had happened. So, if Lady Talarrie Eircelly was known for her wisdom and healing,

Lord Emkay Eircelly was equally renowned for fair and firm justice.

During the day, village women were more apt to come to the kitchen door, slipping into the big warm

room with all its marvelous aromas and giving Livvy some hint of what their problem was. A cup of tea

and a "morsel to eat with it"—anything from a slab of cake or plate of fresh sweet biscuits—would be

instantly served by our Livvy. Even if that had not been Mother's standing order, Livvy was the sort of

person who knew the soothing properties of nice hot tea and a treat or two. Some folk eased in quietly,

almost apologetically; others would already be in tears and found themselves comforted by Livvy's ample

self. The shyer men would come to the kitchen, too, murmuring about not wishing to disturb her ladyship.

"Which same," Livvy would say tartly when she sent Tess to guide them to wherever Mother was at that

time of day, "is exactly what they want to do and why they came. Mostly," Livvy added, banging her pots

and lids about or doubling the energy with which she did her present task, "all they need is to hear pure

common sense. If they'd stop and think, which a body should be able to do, they'd see how to handle

things. Seems to me as if they have to have Authority give 'em the word. Wear Milady out, so they will."

This threat would be accompanied by one of her gusty sighs. "And that's not fair on her. What'll happen if

they've wore her out so much she's unable to see to all the things she has to do in any one day or

another?"

"Could they wear Mother out?" my brother, Tracell, asked, startled. We had seen the latest arrival, for

he had skulked about the herb garden, getting up the courage to come to the kitchen door. And we,

dreadful children that we were, had followed—just in case there might be something we could wheedle

out of Livvy when she had finished dispensing hospitality to him. "I heard her tell Aunt Rachella that it was

having babies that wears her out."

"Most it would, the way she has them," Livvy had said with a snort. "Two at a time."

"Catron came by herself," Tracell reminded her.

Livvy humphed. "Well-bred ladies like your dear mother ought not to be having twins. That's for common

folk, not ladies!"

"Why not?"

"Now, Lady Tirza, that's not for me to tell you and you will kindly forget... what was just said. I wouldn't

want anyone saying I'd said a word against Lady Talarrie." And she passed us the plate of lady cakes.

"Mother's not having another set of twins, is she?" Tracell demanded anxiously.

"I should hope not!" Livvy said so firmly that we knew she must, indeed, know.

Anyway, Mother had always told us, her oldest, when new babies were coming. She'd even known that

Catron was coming by herself. Then she had Andras and Achill. And, when Father came back from the

Miriseng Campaign, she told us that the next pair would be girls, Diana and Desma.

"So, don't you fret, young Tracell," Livvy said, putting the now empty plate in the sink, "about your lady

mother. She's got strength for seven and sense for a dozen. Just do your best not to add to the trials and

tribulations everyone else brings her."

"She's our mother," Tracell said stoutly.

"For which you should be eternally grateful. Now out of my kitchen! I can hear her ladyship's step, and

you've no need to be here to embarrass young Sten. Like as not, she'll have to bring him through here to

the still room, so make yourselves scarce."

As we could hear my mother's voice with the phrase that ever seemed to be on her lips, "I'll just see what

I can do about that right now..." we were out the door in a flash.

"I'll see what I can do about it," was Mother's habitual response to most matters brought to her attention.

In itself, the phrase was unusually effective. For instance, the day Tray fell off his pony and broke one of

the bones in his forearm, her calmly confident, "Now I'll just see what I can do about this..." cut him off

mid-howl even though she had just given a careful yank on his wrist. I had heard the grate of the bones as

they settled into line again. We used our two riding crops as temporary splints, tied on with the flounce of

Mother's petticoat. Tray was too surprised and—I must say—rather brave to forego any further outcry,

though he was dreadfully pale until we got him back to the house and into his bed.

I'm not sure why bad news has to pick nice, sunny spring days to arrive and alter perfectly contented

lives. But I had noticed that Mother had been wearing all three of her special crystals for the last few

days, and usually she wore only the one. She had also been casting frequent glances up the north road,

outside the gates of Mallafret Hall that led to Princestown. I did too, having caught her nervousness, but it

was she in the end who saw the messenger, beating his lathered and weary horse up the long drive.

Immediately she summoned my father from his study, sent me to get ale, bread and cheese from the

kitchen, and ordered Tray to collect one of our fast and durable hunters from the stables.

"Bring up that bright bay, the one you say has no bottom to him," she said. "Bridled."

"No saddle?"

"The messenger will use his own."

"What messenger?" asked Tray, because the thick trunks of the oak trees that lined the drive briefly

masked the oncoming rider.

"The one on his way up the avenue. Go! Now!"

No one argued with that tone in Mother's voice, and Tray raced for the stables as I ran to the kitchen. So

we all appeared, along with Father, just as Prince Sundimin's courier, his face gaunt with fatigue, as

exhausted as the lathered mount who staggered up our drive, reached the wide front stairs.

His message, while brief, was momentous, announcing that Prince Refferns of Effester had started a war

with our Principality. Our good Prince Sundimin perforce had to raise an army to defend our cities and

lands. All liegemen were to honor their oath to their prince.

"Lord Eircelly," the herald gasped, "muster your men with all possible speed." Then he blinked with

gratitude at the tankard of ale, which I held up to him while Mother gestured he should moisten his dry

throat before continuing. "Deepest thanks, milady. Milord, the prince bade me to deliver into your very

hands this message," and he handed over a square of parchment, "and to assure you that the matter is of

the gravest urgency." He then tipped the tankard, drinking a good half of its contents. "I must also beg the

favor of a replacement mount, milord," he continued, "since I have far yet to go before I finish my

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