“My question was: Are you drinking it?” Kincaid reminded him.
“Some of it.”
“Well, start drinking all of it,” Kincaid said.
As he started down the steps Edwin called out, “Supper tomorrow night?”
“No, thanks,” Kincaid said. “Tell Maggie I’ll fend for myself tomorrow.”
“I’ll tell ’er,” Edwin called out. “’Night.”
* * *
* * *
One of the things Kincaid had already bought for his place was a coffeepot. He sat on the sofas with a cup in his hand and looked around. The room looked a little too feminine for his taste, so he was going to need to inject some masculinity into it. The next day was a workday for him, so he’d have to shop for some things on another day. He didn’t need to change the furniture, just take some framed photos of flowers down and put up something else. And then maybe move the furniture around.
He went into the kitchen, poured himself another cup of coffee, then drank while looking around. The kitchen was fine the way it was, since the only thing he’d probably ever do in there was make coffee.
He carried the cup to the bedroom. There was a chest of drawers where he had already stowed his shirts and underwear, and an armoire where he could hang some things. The bedsheets were too frilly, so he was going to have to replace those.
Once he was finished with his second cup of coffee he had pretty much figured out what he needed to do, and thought he could do it in one afternoon. He turned in early so he would be refreshed for his patients in the morning.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A week later Kincaid had two patients in the morning: a man who had driven a nail through his hand while trying to do some carpentry, and a boy who had fallen off a fence and broken his leg. He was drinking a cup of coffee when the door slammed open and a stranger came running in.
“Doc, we got an emergency.”
“What happened?”
“The schoolhouse,” the man said. “The roof collapsed. There’s a lot of people hurt.”
“How’d you get here?” Kincaid asked.
“Buggy.”
That was good. Kincaid hadn’t yet bought his own horse. He grabbed his jacket and medical bag.
“Take me out there.”
“Let’s go.”
They both ran out and climbed into the man’s buggy. The man whipped the horses into a gallop.
“When did this happen?” Kincaid shouted over the noise of the horse and buggy.
“Gotta be half an hour by now,” the man said. “Took me fifteen minutes to ride here.”
Kincaid knew the schoolhouse was in the same county, but he had had no idea it was that close.
“What’s your name?”
“Rance.”
“Anybody dead?” he asked.
“Not that I know,” he said. “Abby—Mrs. Cottrell—told me to come and get you right away.”
“How many kids were inside?”
“I don’t know,” the man said. “I was outside when it happened. The Craddock town council keeps promising to build a new schoolhouse. I guess now they’ll have to.”
Kincaid hung on as they hit some craggy ground, and stopped talking. When they reached the schoolhouse he could see that half the roof had collapsed, and children were lying on the ground outside. The only adult he could see with them was the teacher, Abby Cottrell.
When Rance stopped the buggy Kincaid jumped down, put his hand on the man to keep him from getting down.
“Go and get some more help,” he told him.
“What kind?”
“As many men as you can find,” Kincaid said. “In case there are kids trapped in the rubble.”
“Oh geez,” the man said, “I didn’t think—”
“Go!”
Rance whipped his horse into action again and Kincaid ran over to where Abby was kneeling next to a couple of kids.
“Oh, thank God, Doctor,” she said, when she saw him.
He looked at the children on the ground: three boys, two girls. Two of the boys were bleeding from scalp wounds, one was holding his arm and crying. One girl was bleeding from the cheek, the other was clutching her side.
“How many kids were inside?” he asked.
“A dozen.”
He looked around.
“Are these the ones who got out?”
“Four more,” she said. “They weren’t hurt bad. I had them taken home.”
He turned and looked at the building.
“So there are three more in the building?”
“I couldn’t get to them,” Abby said, her face tearstained. “And I couldn’t leave these children. I think Franky might have a broken rib.”
Kincaid looked at the kids again. The scalp wounds were minor, but bled as scalp wounds did. The cut on the girl’s cheek seemed okay. The only serious injuries were the boy’s arm and the girl’s rib.
He knew Abby had been torn between helping these children and trying to get to the ones still in the rubble. Also, he noticed Abby had a gash above her right eyebrow.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“No.”
He looked around.
“Abby, where’s Franny?”
“I sent her away with the other children,” she said. “Dr.—Gabriel—the kids in the schoolhouse . . .”
“I know,” he said. “I told that fella who came for me to get some more help.”
He touched the boy’s arm, making him hiss in pain.
“I’m sorry, son,” he said. “Just keep it still.” He looked at Abby. “It’s a fracture, but not a bad break.” He looked at the little girl. “Honey, can you take a deep breath for me?”
She did, and then gasped in pain.
“Show me where it hurts.”
The girl pointed. Kincaid touched her, and she gasped again.
“All right,” he said to Abby. “It probably is a fractured rib. Keep her still. I’ll be right back.”
Abby nodded.
Kincaid got up and ran to the rubble. There were actually two walls of the schoolhouse still standing, while the others had crumbled beneath the weight of the falling roof.
“Hello,” he called. “Can you hear me?”
There was no answer.
He wanted to walk into the rubble, but not knowing where the children were, he didn’t want to take a chance of inflicting more pain or damage.
“Hello, kids!” he called. “This is Dr. Kincaid. We’re going to get you out.”
He turned as he heard horses. He saw a couple of riders and a man in a buckboard. He went over to meet them.
“We ran into Rance,” one of the men said. “We got some of the kids at my house and figured you might need some help. Rance went for more. Who’re you?”
“I’m Dr. Kincaid,” he said. “Three of the children didn’t get out. They’ve got to be buried in the rubble. We need to dig them out. But we’ve got to be careful we don’t walk over them, or cause more damage.”
“Oh Jesus,” another man said. “How do we do this?”
“We’ll have to work from the outside in,” Kincaid said. “We can’t walk on top of any of the rubble.”
“Okay,” another man said, “let’s do it.”
Kincaid and the three men went to the rubble and began removing boards and roofing debris, tossing it away, working their way to the center, where most of the damage was.
“Wait,” one of them said. “Oh Christ. Look.”
He pointed and they could see a small arm.
“Let’s dig this child out, but be careful,” Kincaid said.
They began removing boards until they had uncovered a little girl. Kincaid lifted her into his arms.
“Is she . . .” one of the men asked.
; “I’ll check her,” Kincaid said. “Keep digging.”
Kincaid carried the little girl over to where Abby and the other children were. Abby had cleaned the blood from their faces and sat them up. The boy with the broken arm and the girl with the fractured rib were still lying down.
“Oh God,” Abby said, when she saw the child in his arms, “that’s Grace Morgan. Is she . . .”
“I’m checking.”
He laid her down, pressed his ear to her chest. Then he took out his stethoscope, so he could listen for her heartbeat.
“She’s alive, but she can’t breathe,” he told Abby. “I’ve got to aspirate her.”
“Doc! We found another one. A boy!” one of the men shouted.
“Dig him out gently and bring him here!” Kincaid shouted.
He took a tube with a rubber ball on the end of it from his bag, opened the girls mouth. He squeezed the ball, then stuck the tube down her throat and released the ball. He did it again, and then a third time. As the girl started to choke he pulled the tube out. There was dirt and grime inside of it. The girl continued to choke, then took a deep breath and started crying.
“She’ll be all right,” he told Abby, who took the girl into her arms.
One of the men carried a small boy over to them and laid him down on the ground.
“That’s Donny Wilson,” Abby said. “Oh God . . .”
There was blood coming from the boy’s mouth and onto his chest. Kincaid knew even before he bent to listen that the boy was dead. His chest had been crushed. He looked at Abby and shook his head.
“Oh God!” she moaned, hugging Grace tightly.
“One more,” he said, “there’s one more.”
He ran back over to the rubble to help the men dig. More buckboards arrived, with men and women running to help. The women ran to Abby, while the men came to help with the rubble.
“There’s one more child buried here somewhere!” Kincaid shouted. “Just be careful you don’t put your weight down on them.”
He looked over at Abby, saw that some of the women were hugging the children. They were probably mothers who had been told what had happened.
He ran over to them because he didn’t want anyone to pick up the boy with the broken arm or the girl with the cracked rib.
“Doctor, is my boy all right?” one woman asked. She was holding one of the boys with the scalp wound.
“He seems to be, but I want to check him—and all the children—more closely. Let’s do it one at a time.”
While more men came to work on what was left of the schoolhouse, he checked each child closely before allowing a mother or father, or both, to take them away. Finally he was left with the boy and his parents, and the girl and her mother.
He set the boy’s fractured arm and applied a makeshift splint.
“I’ll want you to bring him to my office so I can apply a proper plaster of paris cast,” he told them.
“Can we bring him in tomorrow?” the mother asked. “I want to take him home.”
“Yes,” he said, “but don’t let him move around too much. He’s going to be in pain.”
“Thank you, Doc,” the father said. “We’ll be in your office early tomorrow.”
He worked on the girl next. There wasn’t much he could do for a cracked rib, except to bind her tightly with bandages around her chest.
“Take her home,” he told the mother, “and keep her still. I’ll be by to check on her.”
“Thank you, Doc.”
Kincaid turned, saw Abby standing off to one side, hugging herself. She was staring down at the body of Donny Wilson. He walked over to her.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“No.”
He looked down at the boy.
“His parents aren’t here?”
She wiped tears away and said, “No, not yet.”
“I’m going to see if any of these buckboards have a tarp or blanket I can use to cover the body.”
“All right.”
He did that, found a tarp and brought it over. As he covered the body he heard a cheer go up from the area of the rubble. When he and Abby looked over they saw a small boy walking toward them with two of the men.
“Found him buried in there, Doc,” one said. “He seems okay.”
“That’s Tommy Wilson,” Abby said. “Donny’s brother.”
“Come here, son,” Kincaid said. “Let me have a look at you.”
He checked the boy’s arms and legs, his chest, his head. There wasn’t a scratch on him.
“I got under my desk,” he told Kincaid. “Then I just waited.”
“You’re a smart, brave boy, Tommy,” Kincaid said.
Tommy looked around, then asked Abby, “Where’s my brother? Where’s Donny?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
After all the children were united with their parents, they were left with Tommy Wilson and his dead brother, Donny.
Tommy responded to the news of his brother’s death in a stolid manner.
“I’m gonna get yelled at,” he said to Kincaid.
“Why’s that, Tommy?”
“My mom always said I was the older brother, I was supposed to take care of Donny.”
“How old was Donny?”
“He was eight. I’m nine.”
“I’ll tell your mother this wasn’t your fault,” Kincaid promised.
Tommy shook his head.
“She’s still gonna yell at me.”
“I’ll talk to her. What about your dad, Tommy?”
“My dad went away,” Tommy said.
“Um, where did he go?”
“He went away,” was all the boy would say.
When his mother finally arrived she hugged Tommy and cried after Kincaid told her the terrible news about Donny. Still, Tommy shed no tears. Kincaid thought he was waiting to be yelled at.
“Doctor,” she said, “I want to thank you for what you did for my boy.”
“Ma’am, could we talk?”
“I’ll take Tommy,” Abby said. She walked him over to the buckboard where they had laid Donny’s body.
“Doctor?” their mother said, frowning.
“Mrs. Wilson, Tommy seems to think you’re going to yell at him.”
“Yell at him?” the woman asked. “For what?” The woman’s face was all sharp edges and lines, which had probably been etched there by a hard life. If, as Tommy had said, her husband had left, she was raising two boys alone—and now only one.
“He said he was supposed to look out for Donny because he’s the older brother. He said his father went away.”
“‘Went away’?” she repeated. “His father died when he was five.”
“Does he know that?”
“He does,” she said. “And, Doctor, I’d never yell at him for what happened here. It wasn’t his fault.”
“Well,” Kincaid said, “maybe you should tell him that.”
After Mrs. Wilson had left with her two boys on the buckboard, Kincaid and Abby climbed into Abby’s buggy. First, they stopped at the ranch where Franny and the other uninjured children had been taken, to pick her up.
“Hi, Doc Gabe,” Franny yelled.
“Hi, Franny.”
“The schoolhouse fell down.”
“Yes, I know,” he said, lifting her up onto the buggy.
“Are you comin’ home with us?” she asked.
“Yes, I am,” he said, “for a little while.”
Abby drove the buggy to the small house the county had supplied for her and Franny. Franny went to her room, while he sat at the kitchen table and drank coffee while Abby had tea, both of them covered with dirt from the experience.
“What a day,” she said. “I’ve been after the county for a new schoolhouse since I got here.”
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“And?”
“And they keep promising,” she said. “But nothing happens. Until now.”
“They’ll have to build one now, won’t they?” he asked.
“Unless they have another old building they want to stick us in.”
“Maybe I can talk to them.”
“That might help,” she said. “You were wonderful out there today. How have you been doing since you got here?”
“Just trying to get settled, get accepted . . . I suppose you saw the newspaper my first week in Hays.”
“I was appalled,” she said. “I didn’t know for sure what had happened, but I knew you didn’t deserve such a name.”
“It’s been explained to me by several people that there’s no control over that kind of situation,” Kincaid said. “Someone gives you a name, and it stays with you.”
“Other than that,” she asked, “why wouldn’t you be accepted? You’re a wonderful doctor.”
“Doc Edwin’s been the doctor here for fifty years,” he explained. “I don’t want people to think I’m trying to replace him right away. I’m just trying to work with him, and learn my way here in the West.”
“I’m having the same experience,” Abby said. “I’ve had to change the way I teach, the way I dress, the way I interact with others . . . It’s all very daunting.”
“Are you sorry you came?” he asked.
“Up until today I would’ve said no. Now, I’m just not sure.”
A quiet moment passed between them, each wondering how to comfort the other.
“Well,” he said, “I should be getting back to Hays.”
“Do you have a way to get back?”
“Actually, no,” he said, sheepishly. “I jumped on that fella’s buggy to get to the schoolhouse.”
“Rance,” she said. “He’s a handyman around here. Look, ever since we got here Franny’s been asking me to invite you to supper. Take my buggy back to Hays, and then return it when you come for supper tomorrow night.”
“That sounds like it’ll work,” he said. “Thanks for the transportation, and the invitation.”
“Franny! Doc Gabe is leaving.”
“Aw, Doc Gabe,” the child cried, running out. “Can’t you stay for supper?”
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