Ralph Compton Frontier Medicine

by Robert J. Randisi

  “It’s Mrs. Ward,” she said. “I’m widowed, but you can just call me Maggie. That’s what this old coot does.”

  She left the room as Kincaid reached to raise Dr. Edwin’s trouser legs.

  “Whataya doin’?” Edwin demanded.

  “I want a look at that knee.”

  “I don’t need ya to look at my knee,” Edwin said. “I just said that so that bossy woman would leave us alone to get acquainted.”

  “Well,” Kincaid said, “while we’re doing that, why don’t you just let me have a look.”

  “Oh, fer Pete’s sake—I suppose you want me to take off my pants.”

  “That would be helpful.”

  Edwin glared at him, but got off the table, lowered his trousers, and then slid back up onto the table, his legs dangling.

  “There! Happy?”

  “No, I’m not,” Kincaid said. “It looks swollen. How long ago did you do this?”

  “I told Maggie I did it gettin’ outta the buggy at my patient’s house,” Edwin said. “Truth is, I tripped leavin’ the house and twisted it.

  “So you hitched up your buggy, drove out there and back with your knee like this?”

  “I don’t let little things keep me from seein’ to my patients, Doctor,” Edwin said. “That better be the first thing you learn out here.”

  “The best thing to do would be to put some ice on it,” Kincaid said.

  “I ain’t got no ice,” Edwin said.

  “A cold cloth, then.”

  “Too far away. Just tell that nosy biddy that you examined me and I’m fine.”

  “You’re not fine,” Kincaid said. “Sit still.”

  He leaned forward, probed the knee a bit, causing Edwin to hiss in pain.

  “You’re going to have to stay off this for a few days,” Kincaid told him.

  “A few days?” Edwin grumbled. “I got patients to see to.”

  “Well, that’s why I’m here,” Kincaid said. “I’ll have to see to them for you.”

  “Jus’ like that?” Edwin laughed. “These folks ain’t gonna take kindly to a new face, jus’ like that. I was gonna ease you in to things.”

  “I figured on easing into things, too, Doc,” Kincaid said, “but it looks like that plan is out the window.”

  “Can I pull my pants up now?” Edwin demanded.

  “No,” Kincaid said. “I want to wrap that knee tightly. Where are your bandages?”

  “In that cabinet, yonder,” Edwin said, pointing.

  “Just sit still a while, Doctor,” Kincaid said. “This won’t take long.”

  “Damn foolishness,” Edwin complained, but he sat still for it.

  * * *

  * * *

  Later, they entered the kitchen together, Edwin still limping, though not as badly. Kincaid came in behind him.

  “How is he?” Maggie asked, turning from the stove.

  “He’ll live,” Kincaid said. “But he needs to stay off that leg for a few days.”

  “I’m fine,” Edwin insisted. “Is that coffee ready?”

  “It is.”

  “And the pie?”

  “Of course.”

  Edwin sat at the kitchen table and looked up at Kincaid.

  “She may be a pain in the ass, but she makes the best pie I ever tasted. Siddown!”

  Kincaid sat across from the crusty old sawbones, who he instinctively liked.

  “How old are you?” Edwin asked.

  “Thirty-four,” Kincaid said.

  “Jesus,” Edwin breathed.

  “How old are you?” He was guessing close to eighty.

  “Never you mind,” Edwin replied.

  Maggie set cups and plates down on the table, followed by a coffeepot and a whole pie. She proceeded to pour and slice.

  “I hope apple is all right,” she said.

  “It’s fine,” Kincaid said. “Thank you.”

  “Is he going to be able to see patients?” she asked Kincaid.

  “If they come here, yes,” Kincaid said. “If at the office, or out at their homes, then no. I’ll have to do those.”

  “That could be a problem,” Maggie said, looking at Edwin.

  “I told him that,” Edwin said. “You’re gonna have to go along and introduce him.”

  “I can do that,” she said, “if you promise to stay off that leg while I’m gone.”

  “And if I promise, will you believe me?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Then what’s the point?”

  “Humor me.”

  “All right, woman!” Edwin said. “I promise.”

  “I’m going to unhitch that horse,” she told them.

  Kincaid started to rise.

  “I can do that,” he said.

  “No, no,” she said, putting her hand on his shoulder, “you stay here and get to know each other. After all, you’re going to be starting a lot sooner than any of us thought.”

  As she left by the back door he sat back down.

  “I don’t know what I ever woulda done without her all these years,” Edwin said. Then he pointed a finger at Kincaid and added, “And if you tell her I said that, I’ll deny it.”

  “How long has she been with you?”

  “Gotta be twenty-five years now, ever since her husband died. I was drinkin’ and she was mournin’, and we sorta gravitated to each other. And no, it’s nothin’ like yer thinkin’.”

  “I’m not thinking anything.”

  “Well, lots of folks do,” Edwin groused, “but we’re friends, is all. Good friends. Jesus, I’m old enough to be her father.”

  “I get it,” Kincaid said.

  “Good. Now, tell me about yourself while we eat this pie . . .”

  * * *

  * * *

  Kincaid began with his teens, reading dime novels and wanting to be a real Western gambler. Then, when he turned twenty, his parents died while doctors stood around and said there was nothing they could do. That changed the course of his life.

  He still wanted to go west, though this time it was as a doctor, not a gambler . . .

  “So I went to school, and the first chance I got, I came west.”

  “In answer to my ad.”

  “Right. Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure, go ahead.”

  “Why would you do that?” Kincaid asked. “I mean, put an ad in the paper for a doctor?”

  “I’ve been patching people up around here for nigh on to fifty years,” Edwin said. “I’m about done. Almost blind, can’t walk so well—even before I twisted my knee—and my hands shake if I don’t concentrate. I gotta see to it that this county gets a doctor they can depend on. That means somebody younger and smarter than me.”

  “Smarter?”

  “Medically speaking,” Edwin said. “I ain’t up on all the Eastern advances in medicine. I assume you are. Or you should be.”

  “And if I am?”

  Edwin leaned forward, pushed his empty pie plate out of the way of his elbows.

  “I gotta teach you the ways, out here,” he said. “How to get along with people.”

  “I’ve dealt with people, Doctor,” Kincaid said.

  “Not these kind, Doctor,” Edwin said. “Not Westerners.”

  “I thought the Old West was dying,” Kincaid said.

  “Then why’d you come out here?”

  “Because it’s different,” Kincaid answered.

  “Well,” Edwin said, sitting back, “at least you got that right.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  When Maggie came back, both doctors were finished with their coffee and pie.

  Edwin stood up.

  “I’m gonna go and lie down,” he told Kincaid. “The other bedroom? The neat one? Th
at’s yours.”

  “Oh, that’s okay,” Kincaid said. “I can find a place—”

  “I’ll need you to stay here, at least until your education is done,” Edwin said. “Maggie’ll show ya.”

  Edwin shuffled from the room.

  “How was the pie?” Maggie asked.

  “It was excellent,” Kincaid told her. “Do you do all the cooking?”

  “Yes,” she said. “It’s one of my chores around here. Another is cleaning. Your room is spotless. I’d appreciate it if you kept it that way.”

  “You mean, unlike his?”

  “I can’t control him,” she said, “but if I get to you early, who knows?”

  “Lucky for you,” he said, “I’m just naturally neat.”

  “Let’s go, then.”

  They went to the front door, where Kincaid had left his bags. Then he followed her to the neat bedroom down the hall from Doc Edwin’s.

  “Here you go,” Maggie said. “If you need anything else, you just let me know.”

  “I’ll do that, Maggie,” Kincaid promised.

  “Supper’s at seven,” she said. “Doc likes to eat late.”

  “Fine with me,” Kincaid said.

  “I suppose I’m going to have to start saying Doc Edwin and Doc Kincaid, huh?”

  “Why don’t you just call me Gabe?” Kincaid suggested.

  “I think I’ll go with Gabriel,” she said. “Is that okay? I just need something to tell you apart.”

  “That’ll work just fine,” he told her.

  She smiled and went back up the hall.

  Kincaid unpacked his bags, put his clothes in the dresser drawers and armoire, his medical bag on top of the dresser, next to the pitcher and basin. The old house had no indoor plumbing, except for a pump in the kitchen sink, so he assumed there was an outhouse in the back. He wondered if a hotel in town had indoor facilities. He would avail himself of Doc Edwin’s hospitality for a while. But eventually he’d find his own place.

  He poured some water into the basin, washed his hands and face, changed his shirt. Then he went back up the hall, passing Doc Edwin’s room. The door was open and he could see the older man lying on his bed, snoring loudly.

  He found Maggie in the kitchen, where he saw a bathtub in a corner. She was cutting vegetables.

  “You want a bath?” she asked, seeing where his eyes had gone.

  “Maybe later,” he said. “Outhouse in the back?”

  “I’m afraid so,” she answered. “You must be used to having it indoors.”

  “I’ll get used to it.”

  “Once the doc’s got you educated—his word, not mine—you can always move to one of the hotels in town. They’ve got indoor facilities.”

  “That’s good to know,” he said. “For later. Is there anything I can do now?”

  “Not unless somebody comes to the door needing medical attention,” she said. “You might as well just relax. Tomorrow the doc will put you through your paces, introduce you around. Oh, wait, I guess I’m going to have to do that, since he twisted his knee, the old fool.”

  “He told me you’ve been friends a long time,” Kincaid said.

  “That’s right,” she said. “Since my husband died.”

  “You must’ve been a young widow,” he said. “Never wanted to remarry?”

  “Hell, no,” she said. “The one I got the first time cured me of marriage. Hell, I was trying to figure out how to kill him and get away with it when he just up and died.”

  “What did he die of?”

  “Nobody knows for sure,” she said. “Some people in town will tell you I poisoned him.”

  “Doc didn’t say what killed him?”

  “He said it seemed to be a reaction to something he ate,” Maggie said. “His throat closed up, he couldn’t breathe, and he died.”

  “Was there an investigation?”

  “There was,” she said, “especially when people started talking about poison. But Doc told them there was no poison, just a bad reaction.”

  “And then you came to work for him?”

  “That’s right.”

  “There’s only two bedrooms,” he said. “Have I taken yours away from you?”

  “Oh, I don’t live here,” she told him. “I’ve got my own place.”

  “Where?”

  “Not far from here,” she said. “Just a small house.”

  “By yourself?”

  “That’s right,” she said. “I never had kids, thank God. Not with that man.”

  “We’ve got a couple of hours before supper, right?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “I’m going to take a walk,” he told her.

  “Go ahead,” she said. “You can’t get lost. Just follow the street, it’ll take you to the center of town. Folks’ll look funny at you and wonder, but nobody’ll bother you. It ain’t that kind of town.”

  “That’s good to know,” he said. “I just want to stretch my legs and build up an appetite.”

  “Walking’s good for you,” she said. “Doc always says so. Part of his being so crotchety these days is that he can’t walk very far anymore.”

  “Maybe I can do something about that,” Kincaid said.

  “What can you do?” she asked. “The old goat is eighty years old.”

  “We’ll see,” Kincaid said. “I’ll be back for supper.

  * * *

  * * *

  Kincaid did as Maggie suggested, followed the street all the way to the center of town. The tall, handsome stranger attracted curious looks from the men and admiring glances from the ladies.

  He didn’t know very much about Western life, as this was his first time west of the Mississippi. Of course, he’d heard stories and read some of the books, but this was the 1880s and the Wild West was supposed to be a thing of the past. Still, he passed many men with guns in their belts, but luckily, didn’t see a single gun battle like those he’d read about.

  As he reached a large establishment called the Silver Dollar Saloon he decided to go in and see if everything he’d heard about Western saloons was true.

  It was fairly late in the day and he found the inside teeming with activity. Men were drinking and gambling, girls were working the floor. The bartender was busy pouring drinks.

  Kincaid walked to the bar, where nobody made a move to make room for him. Several of the men took the time to look him up and down, which he assumed was because he was a stranger. Later, he found out it was because of the way he was dressed.

  He finally managed to inch his way to the bar, waved at the bartender.

  “Can I get a beer, please?”

  “Comin’ up!”

  The bartender moved fast, and every drink he served left a puddle on the bar top.

  Kincaid turned with the beer mug in his hand, allowing it to drip on the floor without getting on his pants or shoes. Then, staring down at the tips of his shoes, he realized he might be the only man in the place not wearing boots. He was going to have to buy a pair.

  He walked around, stopping briefly at a faro table, a craps table, and a wheel of fortune, before he reached an area where a couple of poker games were going on. In his youth, when he intended to be a gambler, poker was his game. Now, as he watched the cards and chips move around the table, he felt a pull.

  Right at that moment one player stood up and said, “I’m done,” and walked out. Kincaid figured he still had a little time before supper.

  “Mind if I sit in?” he asked.

  The four men at the table looked up at him, then three looked back at their cards. The fourth smiled and said, “Pull up a chair. Five card draw is all we play at this table.”

  “That’s fine with me.”

  He sat down, took some money out of his pocket.

  “Dol
lar and two,” the man said, “anything opens.”

  “Sounds good.”

  The hand that had been in progress was over and the man who had told him to sit down gathered cards up for the deal. He was seated directly across from Kincaid.

  “Dollar ante,” he said.

  Kincaid nodded and tossed in a bill.

  “You want chips?” the man asked.

  “Can money play?” he asked.

  “Every time,” the man answered.

  “I can’t stay long,” Kincaid said. “I just thought I’d play a few hands.”

  “Up to you,” the dealer said.

  Nobody bothered to introduce themselves, and nobody took it upon themselves to introduce others, so he kept his name to himself. It was all about the cards, anyway, not names. That was the kind of game he had always liked to play in. He never sat down at a poker table to make friends.

  He gathered up his cards for his first hand, saw that he had a pair of jacks. The man to his right opened for two dollars, and he just called. So did everybody else.

  “Cards?” the dealer asked.

  The opener took three.

  “Three,” Kincaid said, tossing his discards onto the table.

  The others took three, except for the dealer, who took two.

  Kincaid figured the dealer for three of a kind, but he had drawn a third jack. That meant the man needed queens, kings, or aces to beat him.

  The others might have made three of a kind as well, but when the opener said, “Five dollars,” Kincaid said, “Raise ten,” to find out whose hand had improved.

  The man to his left said, “I fold.”

  That left it up to the dealer. Kincaid could see the man to his left already getting ready to drop his cards into the discard pile.

  “I’ll raise you ten,” the dealer said.

  As Kincaid had figured, the fifth man folded, leaving it up to the opener.

  “Shit,” the man said, “fold.”

  Now there was only one way to see if the dealer had improved.

  “I call,” Kincaid said.

  “Trip tens,” the dealer said, dropping them face up on the table.

  “Three jacks,” Kincaid said.

  “Yeah, I figured,” the dealer said, as Kincaid raked in his pot.