Ed disappeared and returned shortly with a bowl of sliced apples.
“That oughta do the trick,” Jack said. “Ed, you hold her steady for me. Lily, why don’t you come over here and feed Minnie some apple? If you’re gonna draw her, you might as well get acquainted with her.”
Lily approached the pen reluctantly. “Uh, what if she bites me?”
Jack laughed. “I can’t believe you’ve got that big monster of a dog at your house, and you’re scared of a pig biting you. Just put the apple in your palm and hold your hand flat. That way she won’t be able to get a hold of your hide.”
My hide? Lily thought, but she did as she was told. Minnie slurped the apple slice off her hand gratefully.
While Lily concentrated on the sow’s mouth, Jack squatted down at its opposite end and rolled up the sleeves of her coveralls. “Keep those apple slices coming, Lily. I’m about to do somethin’ the ole girl’s not gonna appreciate a bit.”
Lily dutifully served up the apple, glad that she was dealing with the preferable end of the pig.
“No wonder that piglet’s stuck, Ed. It’s trying to back out of her.”
“It still alive?” Ed asked.
“Yup,” Jack muttered. “Won’t be for long, though, if we don’t get it out.”
Lily doled out more apple while Jack rummaged around in the pig’s nether regions. “Damn,” Jack said. “She’s tight in there. Being scared’s caused her to seize up, I reckon.” Jack moved around in an attempt to get a better angle. “Damn it, Ed, would you believe my hand’s too big to get a grip on the little fella?” She groped around a few more seconds, then said, “Hey, Lily, would you come here a minute?”
“What for?”
“I want you to wash your hands, then see if you can get a grip on this piglet.”
Lily shuddered. Knowledge of animals’ insides was definitely not required in order to draw them for a picture book. “I was having a hard enough time just feeding her this apple.”
“It’s either you try to do it or I kill this piglet so the others can get out.”
Lily rose and scrubbed her hands. She was squeamish as hell about getting so intimate with a hoofed creature, but as a vegetarian, she was supposedly devoted to protecting animal life.
Jack gestured toward the pig’s orifice. “Now if you can just wedge your hand in so you can get a good grip around the piglet’s middle, you can pull it right out.”
“Sorry, Minnie,” Lily mumbled as she shoved her hand into the sow’s vagina. “Usually I at least buy a girl dinner before we get to this part.”
As Lily groped around in the darkness, she suddenly felt the warmth and movement of a living creature. The piglet was wedged in tight, but she slowly worked her hand alongside it, and then painstakingly turned her wrist until she was gripping the animal just behind what felt like its back legs.
“Got it ... I think.”
“Okay,” Jack said. “Now pull, but go easy.”
Gripping the tiny animal firmly, Lily brought her arm back in a slow, steady pull. The piglet’s curly tail was visible first, then finally its wet pink ears and snout. “It’s breathing!” Lily cried, overcome with the emotion of the moment. “Is it a boy or a girl?”
Jack glanced under the pig’s tail. “Looks like a girl.”
Ed looked at Lily and laughed. He apparently wasn’t used to seeing someone get so worked up over livestock.
“Well, it sure is,” Jack said. “Ed, I reckon you’ll have to name this piglet Lily ... after her midwife.”
Ed grinned. “You’re plum crazy, Doc ... not changed a lick since you was a little girl.”
Jack grinned back. “Why don’t you get us some more hot water so we can wash up? I’ll stay till all the piglets are born, but my guess is the rest of the delivery will go normally.”
It did go normally. Minnie lay on her side and squeezed out piglet after piglet, until the litter totaled seven. Lily sketched the pigs while Jack kept the apple slices coming.
“How they doing?” Ed asked when he returned with fresh water.
“They look great,” Jack said.
“Well, Vina’s got some breakfast cooked, if y’all wanna eat before you go.”
“You know me,” Jack said, scrubbing her hands. “I wouldn’t miss one of Vina’s breakfasts.
They’re this job’s number-one fringe benefit.”
Lily sat with Jack at the table in Ed and Vina’s spotless kitchen, with the morning sun shining through the red-and-white gingham curtains. The table was spread with an artery-clogging breakfast buffet: hot biscuits, red-eye gravy, cooked apples, fried eggs, grits, ham, bacon, and sausage.
“Now you girls eat all the biscuits you want,” Vina, a smiling, plump woman said, filling their mugs with coffee. “I just put another pan in the oven.”
“Thanks, but I’m sure one pan will be plenty,” Lily said. But after she saw the way Jack was filling up her plate, she wasn’t so sure anymore. She bit into a biscuit and surveyed the numerous pig products on the table uneasily. “So,” she said, “what’s gonna happen to my piggy namesake after she grows up?”
“Same thing that happens to most pigs, I reckon,” Ed said, spearing a sausage patty.