by Nan Ryan
Brit blew out a plume of cigar smoke, then, thinning his lips over his teeth, whistled for Captain. The gray’s ears pricked up and he immediately came to his master. He nuzzled Brit’s shoulder, and Brit smiled and affectionately patted his jaw.
Brit dropped his cigar, crushed it out beneath his boot heel and swung up into the saddle for the long ride south to the Agua Fria division headquarters of The Regent. He planned to spend at least three or four days at Agua Fria, the area hardest hit by the drought because of its location down near the border.
An extended visit to Agua Fria would serve two purposes.
First, he could work alongside and reassure the anxious vaqueros that no one would be losing his job on The Regent.
Second, and more importantly, it gave Brit an excuse to stay away from the mansion.
On that same sweltering July morning, Anna smilingly greeted Dr. McCelland and ushered him directly back to LaDextra’s ground floor sitting room. She then left the two of them alone, closing the door behind her, but she paced just outside.
Anna was worried about LaDextra.
Since the Fourth of July party more than three weeks ago, LaDextra had seemed uncommonly tired, had spent a great deal of time resting in her room. Which wasn’t like her. Yet every time Anna asked if anything was wrong, if she was feeling weak or ill, LaDextra assured her that she was fine, just fine.
Anna stopped pacing when the door opened and Dr. McCelland said, “You can come in now, Anna. We’re finished here.”
Anna anxiously hurried inside and straight to LaDextra’s chair. Dropping to her knees beside the chair and taking the older woman’s hand in both of her own, Anna said, “Tell me the truth, are you okay? Are you really feeling well?”
LaDextra squeezed her hand. “Fit as a fiddle.”
Skeptical, Anna, glancing at the doctor, asked, “Then what is Dr. McCelland doing here again so soon after his last visit?”
“You tell her, Doctor,” said LaDextra.
The doctor smiled, took a chair and, leaning forward, explained, “As I may have mentioned to you before, Anna, I make regular calls on all the division headquarters of The Regent. Today I’m due at the Columbine. So I just stopped by here on the way.”
“Satisfied?” LaDextra asked, smiling down at Anna.
Nodding, Anna released LaDextra’s hand and rose to her feet. “I suppose.” Then she asked, “How far is it from here to the Columbine?”
“Five, six miles,” said the doctor.
“Take me with you!” Anna said impulsively.
The doctor blinked. LaDextra, starting to frown, asked, “Whatever for, child? Dr. McCelland will likely stay at the Columbine all day. You’d get very bored sitting around waiting for him.”
Anna said, “But I wouldn’t just sit around and wait. I would help out. Don’t you see, LaDextra, The Regent is my home and I love it as you do.” LaDextra smiled, pleased with the statement. Anna continued, “I love this ranch and the people on it, and I’d like to be more useful, to help out in some small way.”
“Why, honey, you’re a great help and comfort to me,” said LaDextra.
As if she hadn’t spoken, Anna said, “When I was at the convent, the sisters taught me to tend the sick, and I became quite good at it.” She looked anxiously from one to the other. “Don’t you see, I could assist Dr. McCelland. I’m not the least bit squeamish. I’ve dressed wounds and bathed frail bodies and held the hands of the dying and—and surely an extra pair of hands would come in handy.”
“Oh, Anna, I don’t know,” LaDextra said thoughtfully, “it’s hot as Hades out there and—”
“I don’t mind a little heat.” Anna quickly assured her. “Oh, please say yes. Please. I want to go.”
LaDextra sighed heavily. “You’ll wear a hat and take a canteen of cold water?”
“Absolutely,” Anna promised. “Then I may go? You don’t mind?”
LaDextra looked from Anna to the doctor. “What about it, Doctor? Would she be in your way?”
The doctor needlessly cleared his throat. He said, “On the contrary, I am sure Anna would be a great asset, very helpful.”
“Then it’s settled!” Anna declared excitedly, leaping to her feet. “I’ll go change right now.”
A half hour later Anna and Dr. McCelland were riding through the bushy slag below the Pine Spring Canyon trailhead, heading due east. Her hat brim pulled low over her eyes, heavy hair tucked up under the hat, Anna felt the hot winds stinging her face, the perspiration pooling between her breasts.
She didn’t mind.
The heat, the wind, the ride made her feel alive again. It was the first time she’d felt anything since she had come down the stairs the morning after the Fourth of July celebration and seen the unmistakable indifference in Brit’s dark eyes. Since that horrible moment she had been imprisoned inside the house, hardly leaving her room, afraid that she might bump into Brit. Thankfully, she hadn’t. She supposed it was because he was rarely home of late.
LaDextra bemoaned the fact that Brit was never home for dinner anymore, that she never got to see him. She blamed his absence on the worsening drought, saying that Brit, as the general manager of the entire operation, was working even harder than usual this summer. He was, she explained—although Anna hadn’t asked—dividing his time among the four division headquarters. It fell to him to keep the worried cowboys’ spirits up, to reassure them that they would all get through this terrible drought together, that The Regent would survive and prosper.
Anna always politely listened as LaDextra extolled Brit’s unflagging dedication to the ranch’s operations. But she doubted he was all that dedicated. She suspected his nights were not spent in a narrow cot in some distant bunkhouse, but in the comfortable bed—and possessive arms—of the red-haired Beverly Harris.
“Anna?”
Brought back to the present, Anna, realizing her sorrel mare, Dancer, had slowed to a walk, blinked at Dr. McCelland and said, “I’m sorry, I—”
“I said we’re here.” Pointing, he directed her attention to a long, low adobe building a hundred yards ahead, baking in the hot Texas sunshine. Baking along with the sand-colored building were the ailing people gathered there, anxiously awaiting the doctor’s visit.
Their eyes lit up when they saw the kind physician, whom they trusted to make them feel better. A mannerly bunch, they lined up to patiently wait their turn as Anna followed Dr. McCelland inside the adobe to the large, sterile room where he treated his patients.
Minutes after their arrival, Anna found herself elbow deep in coughing, feverish children, worried young mothers, bruised and battered vaqueros and cowboys.
Her hat tossed aside, sleeves rolled up, Anna worked tirelessly alongside the gentle doctor, cleansing dirt-and-gravel-encrusted abrasions, assisting as he set broken arms and legs, holding crying babies as he gave them medication.
The work was so demanding, so steady, there was not a single minute when the examining room was empty. The hours rushed by in a blur. In fact, the summer sun was slipping toward the horizon when the very last patient, a leathery old cowhand with a badly swollen thumb infected from an imbedded prickly pear sticker, was finally tended and sent on his way.
Anna had been so busy she hadn’t had time to think about anything other than helping Dr. McCelland. It was a welcome respite from her own personal pain. For the past several grueling hours her heart had not hurt, because she had been too busy to think about Brit.
Nor had she realized that she was tired. Now her back was aching badly between her shoulder blades and her legs felt as if she couldn’t possibly stand for another minute.
She must have looked as exhausted as she felt because the concerned doctor, urging her down onto a straight-backed chair, said, “I shouldn’t have brought you here, Anna. It was too hard on you. I should have known better.”
“No, no it wasn’t,” she argued. “Please, Dr. McCelland, don’t tell LaDextra you think I’m not up to it, because I am, really I am.
This day has meant so much to me. I feel so peaceful and happy and, yes, tired, but a good kind of tired. Can you understand that?”
Standing above her, his arms crossed over his white-jacketed chest he smiled and said, “Yes, I can. Caring for the sick is a rewarding occupation. But I’m afraid that you are too fragile to—”
“I am not.” She jumped to her feet to face him. “I’m a strong, healthy woman and I want to do this. It means so much to me. Please, say you’ll allow me to accompany you to the other division headquarters.”
“But, Anna,” he explained, “that’s out of the question. Why, Agua Fría, the southern division headquarters, is a good twenty miles from the ranch house. It can’t be done in a day. You can’t ride all that way, tend the patients and come back the same night.”
“Oh,” she said, her brows knitting. “No, of course you can’t…. So, when you visit the Agua Fría, do you spend the night?”
“Yes, I usually ride out late the afternoon before, spend the night, then get up early and treat my patients.”
“Then I will spend the night, too. Surely they have facilities to put up guests.”
“Hardly the kind of quarters you are used to, Anna.”
“You’re forgetting, Dr. McCelland, until a few months ago the quarters I was used to were nothing but a cot on the floor behind the convent kitchen. Before that, when I lived with the Apache, my accommodations were the hard, cold ground, without benefit of blanket or pillow. I am no hothouse orchid, Doctor.”
“No,” he said, gazing at her with frank admiration, “I guess you’re not.” For a long moment he said nothing more, just looked at her. Then, his voice soft, he said, “Anna, I—I…” Impulsively, he raised a hand to touch her face, leaned close and started to kiss her.
“No,” Anna said gently, turning her head slightly. “Don’t, please….”
“I’m sorry.” He immediately dropped his hand and stepped back.
She turned back to face him, and looking directly into his eyes, she told him, “I think the world of you, Doctor, you know I do, but I…”
He nodded, said, “It’s Brit, isn’t it?”
“Brit? Brit Caruth? Certainly not! Never in a million years. Whatever gave you such a ludicrous idea? Good Lord, if he were the last man on earth, I wouldn’t—”
Interrupting, Dr. McCelland said softly, “I saw the way he looked at you at the Fourth of July celebration.”
Anna shrugged slender shoulders. “Well, I can’t help it if he—”
“And I saw the way you looked at him.” Anna gave no reply. She lowered her head. The doctor again apologized. “I shouldn’t have said that. Forgive me. What’s between you and Brit is none of my concern and I swear to you that I’ll never mention it again.” He paused, then quickly changed the subject. “If LaDextra will allow it, I look forward to having you work with me in the days and weeks to come.”
Anna slowly raised her eyes to meet his. She caught the wistful expression in his light eyes. Then it was gone and he smiled at her. He looked amazingly fresh and boyish despite the long, hard day, and Anna wondered sadly why things couldn’t be different. Why couldn’t she feel about this kind, caring physician the way she felt about Brit Caruth?
She sighed wearily and said, “Be my friend, Dr. McCelland.”
“I am your friend, Anna,” he replied. “I will always be. Now I’d better get you home before LaDextra sends the ranch guards out looking for us.”
Twenty-One
“…And then he said, ‘You look even prettier than you did last night,’ and I said, ‘Oh, go on, you’re just buttering me up,’ and he said, ‘No, I’m not, I think you’re just about the most beautiful girl in all Texas,’ and I said…”
A starry-eyed Sally Horner was regaling Anna, happily repeating every word she could remember of last night’s conversation with her attentive new beau, Buck Shanahan.
The two good friends, wearing only their lacy underwear in a futile attempt to stay cool in the broiling summer heat, were lying across Anna’s soft wide bed.
It was midafternoon, the hottest part of the blistering late-July day. The big house was quiet. LaDextra was napping in her room. The servants were in their quarters. Siesta time at The Regent.
Anna yawned.
She was tired, sleepy. Had she been alone she would have taken a much needed nap. Yesterday’s long, hard hours spent helping Dr. McCelland at the Columbine division headquarters had left her exhausted, and yet, when bedtime came last night, she hadn’t been able to fall asleep. Had stayed awake into the wee small hours of the morning.
It was the same every night.
No matter how tired she was or how late she went to bed, sleep would not come. Only painful memories followed by wrenching regret. She suffered, but she was determined to suffer in silence and in secret. She had told no one what had happened at the Fourth of July celebration, would never tell anyone.
Not even Sally.
“…And then, after a late dinner with my family, Buck and I took a carriage ride in the moonlight. And you’ll never guess who we ran into. Brit.” At the mention of Brit’s name, Anna involuntarily tensed. “He was leaving town at about the same time we were leaving the house. He stopped and talked with us for a few minutes.” Sally, lying on her stomach, bare, feet in the air, ankles crossed, frowned suddenly, twisted a rebellious, reddish-brown curl around her finger and added, “I think he’d been drinking heavily, he was slurring his words.”
Anna made no comment, instead yawned dramatically to indicate she wasn’t the least bit interested in Brit Caruth’s whereabouts or his level of sobriety.
Sally continued, “Something’s bothering Brit. Buck said so himself.”
Anna felt her heartbeat quicken, but she said levelly, “Of course, something’s bothering him, Sally. This terrible drought. He’s worried about what’s going to happen to The Regent.”
“Well, sure, that too, but… Mmm, I don’t know, it’s something more. Buck thinks so, too. He says Brit is just not himself lately. He’s distant and irritable and…” Sally suddenly turned questioning eyes directly on Anna and said, “When are you going to tell me what really happened the night of the Fourth? I have waited patiently for three long weeks, supposing that since I am your closest, dearest friend, you would, when you were ready, tell me the truth about that night.”
Anna, lying on her back, knees bent, bare feet flat on the mattress, stretched lazily and said as casually as possible, “Nothing out of the ordinary. I had a lovely time at the party, just like everyone else.” She forced herself to smile, adding, “Well, perhaps I didn’t have as good a time as you.”
“Or,” Sally said thoughtfully, “perhaps you had an even better time.”
“What a ridiculous thing to say,” Anna replied, hoping her hot face had not turned beet-red. “You’re the one who collected a new beau.”
Sally put her hands on the mattress, levered herself up to her knees and sat back on her bare heels. Narrowing her eyes, she stared down at Anna and asked bluntly, “Just where were you from midnight till 2:00 a.m. on the Fourth? Tell me the truth.”
“At the party, of course—where else would I have been?”
“I don’t know,” Sally admitted, “but I do know that Brit was missing for those same couple of hours.”
“Really?” Anna tried to sound nonchalant. “Well, you might want to check with the red-haired widow, Beverly Harris. She could probably provide the answer.”
Sally shook her head. “I’ve told you repeatedly that Beverly Harris was beside herself searching for Brit. If she asked Buck once, she asked a half-dozen times if he’d seen Brit. She was frantic.” Sally paused, waited for Anna to respond. Anna said nothing. Sally accused, “You know more than you’re saying. I know you do. You were with Brit that night, weren’t you?”
Her heart now drumming inside her chest, Anna was determined she would not give herself away. Ashamed of her wanton behavior and crushed by Brit’s cold rejection, she could never
let even Sally know what had happened. She worried constantly that Brit would tell—or had told—Buck all about it. That he had bragged that he’d had her in the stables like a mare mounted by a stud, and then the two men had laughed about it. The only thing she was sure of was that even if Buck knew, he hadn’t discussed it with Sally.
If he had, Sally would have told her.
Determined to distract her friend, to get her off the subject, Anna said, “Are you seeing Buck again tonight?”
The frown of puzzlement on Sally’s face turned quickly to a smile of pleasure. “Yes! Can you believe it, Anna? We’ve been together every night since the Fourth and he says he just can’t get enough of me. Isn’t that romantic? Am I the luckiest woman in Texas?”
“You are,” said Anna, “and I’m happy for you.”
“I know you are,” Sally said. “Oh, by the way, I want you to do me a big favor.”
“Sure, if I can. What is it?”
“Well, since I’ve been with Buck so often, I’m running out of different things to wear. I certainly don’t want him seeing me in the same dress twice, so I must do some serious shopping.”
“Yes. So?”
“So you must go shopping with me, help me choose some pretty new clothes. I thought, if you agree, you could come into town this Saturday and help me pick out some things at Lily’s Ladies’ Wear Salon. You have such good taste and, Lord knows, I don’t. I’d love to find something half as attractive as that white eyelet dress you wore the night of the Fourth.”
Anna inwardly cringed. The beautiful white eyelet dress, with bits of hay still sticking to it, was wrinkled and soiled and hidden from the laundress, tucked up on a high shelf in the back of her closet. She now hated the dress she had loved so much. She never intended to wear it again.
“You’ll help me choose some dresses,” Sally was saying. “Afterward, we will have a late lunch at the Regentville Hotel. Buck is meeting me there at—”
“You’re having lunch with Buck?”
“No, we’re having lunch with Buck,” Sally said, smiling.
