Reluctant Brides Collection

by Cathy Marie Hake

  “He usually heads straight south first,” Peter answered. “There’s a woman in a little place along the harbor who’s due to have a baby any day now. My guess is that he went to check on her.”

  “I know the place,” Matt said. He grabbed at the wagon hitch and set the horse free. “Take him somewhere,” he instructed. “Make him comfortable. I’ll be back with Josh.”

  Matt jumped on the horse and galloped off. Peter scrambled up into the wagon and put his hand under Troy’s head.

  “Where is the wound?” Travis asked, unwrapping the blanket from around Troy.

  “It’s his leg,” Peter exclaimed. “It’s cut deeply. Someone had the good sense to tie a tourniquet above the wound.”

  “His clothes are drenched,” Travis said. “He’s already lost a lot of blood.”

  “What can we do?” Percy asked.

  “Matt is right. We should take him somewhere and get him comfortable?”

  “Where?”

  “Wherever we take him, he’ll have to stay awhile,” Peter said. “He’s going to need a lot of care.”

  “I’m afraid our back porch just won’t do,” Travis said. “Besides, it’s too far up the street. Matt took the horse. We don’t have time to fetch another one to hitch the wagon to.”

  Travis and Peter looked at each other, then at Percy. “We’ll have to take him to the mess hall,” Peter said. “We’re right here in front of it.”

  “Yes, and there’s plenty of water and clean rags,” Travis said. “We can start trying to get him cleaned up so Josh can see what he’s doing.”

  “The mess hall?” Percy echoed faintly.

  “Percy,” Travis said gently, “I’m afraid we’re going to need your bed for a while.”

  “My bed?” Indignation rose within her. How dare they invade the only private space she had—and for Troy Wilger!

  “I know it’s an inconvenience,” Travis said. “But right now, taking him there makes the most sense.”

  “You’re right,” Peter agreed. He placed his hands under Troy’s shoulder. “Help me carry him. Percy, you get the door.”

  Numbly, she followed their instructions. She held open the door as Peter and Travis carried Troy as quickly and gently as possible, then she led the way back to her little room. They laid him on the bed.

  “We need rags,” Travis said, “and hot water. Do you have any on the stove?”

  Percy rallied. Travis was right. The mess hall was well supplied to care for the injured man.

  “Yes, of course,” she said. “I’ll be right back.” She scurried into the kitchen and scooped up a handful of dish towels, knowing that she might never again be able to use them in the kitchen. She filled a small pot with water and returned to the bedroom as quickly as she could. “Here, start with these. The water is not hot, but I’ll put some on to heat.”

  “Troy!” Travis called loudly. “Troy, can you hear me?”

  There was no response.

  “He’s out cold,” Peter said. “He’s lost too much blood. We’ve got to get these clothes off of him and make sure the bleeding has stopped. Percy, bring me your kitchen shears.”

  Once again Percy followed instructions. Then she returned to the kitchen long enough to stoke up the stove fire and pump water into a pot. Back in the bedroom, she found Peter and Travis slicing through the sticky mess of Troy’s denim pants. She grimaced and her stomach lurched as they exposed the wound. The saw had cut deeply into Troy’s thigh.

  “How could this happen?” she asked.

  “That doesn’t matter right now,” Peter answered. “We just have to take care of him and pray that Joshua gets here soon.”

  Percy’s head spun as she looked at the clock on her bedroom wall. How much time had passed since Matt took off in search of Josh? It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, but it already felt like hours. A few minutes earlier, she had been anticipating a leisurely afternoon with the few other women around her. Now a man she strongly disliked was lying on her bed, helpless and at her mercy. In a moment, her life had changed.

  She closed her eyes against the thought of what this change might mean. She had not yet recovered from the last time that her life had changed in an instant.

  Where was Josh?

  Chapter 13

  For more than three hours, Peter, Travis, and Percy tended Troy Wilger, whose consciousness rose and fell at random intervals and endured only briefly. When he was awake, the unbearable pain and blood loss soon drove him to the respite of unconsciousness again. While he lay limp on the bed, Peter and Travis huddled over his wounds. They had cut away his soiled dungarees and stemmed the bleeding enough to loosen the tourniquet and restore circulation to the leg. The wound gaped open, ugly and vicious. The blood flow was no longer rapid, but the fact that it still seeped concerned everyone. They changed the cloths every few minutes. Percy was running out of clean rags to offer.

  Peter and Travis speculated on the facts of the accident. Had Troy been working the saw and lost control? His years of experience made that seem unlikely. Was Carson Gregory on the other end of the saw and had he deliberately become aggressive? They hated to think Carson was capable of such maliciousness. Peter and Travis shook their heads in befuddlement, realizing the pointlessness of their speculation. They would have to wait until they could gather the facts. Besides, what they needed most right now was not an explanation but a doctor.

  Every few minutes Percy restlessly raised her eyes to the door frame, hoping to see Josh. Several times one of the vigil keepers went outside to look down the street, hoping to catch sight of him and signal where he should come. Finally, Josh exploded through the front door. Percy heard his thundering steps as he crashed across the wooden planks of the mess hall floor. Her heart in her throat, she met him in the kitchen.

  “What happened?” he asked urgently as he pushed his way past her.

  “We’re not sure. We thought Matt might have told you.”

  He shook his head. “There was no time. He only said that it was very bad.”

  “It is.”

  By this time Josh had squeezed into her little bedroom to see for himself. Travis and Peter lurched to their feet. With Troy on the bed and four people standing, the room was crowded. Josh pushed his way past the others and knelt at the side of the bed to examine the wound.

  “Matt was right,” he soon announced. “It’s a serious wound.”

  “Will he lose the leg?” Peter asked anxiously.

  Josh sighed. “I hope not. I’m going to try to sew it back together. Let’s pray there’s been no chance for gangrene to set in.” He set his medical bag solidly on the floor beside him and swiftly opened it.

  “How much help will you need?” Travis asked.

  “I need one of you to stay,” Josh answered without looking up. “It’s too warm and dark and crowded in here with all of you here. Travis, you and Peter go find out what happened. Percy can stay with me.”

  Percy was about to protest, but Travis cut her off. “Good. I would like to ride out and see if anyone saw what happened. If I hear anything that leads me to think this was intentional—”

  “Don’t jump to conclusions,” Peter warned. “Accidents happen, even to someone as experienced as Troy Wilger.”

  Travis blew out his breath. “You’re right. But I do want to get the facts straight. If it was an accident, we want to be sure it won’t happen to anyone else.”

  “Percy, I’m going to need better light,” Josh said, ignoring the interchange between Travis and Peter. “See how many lamps you can round up.”

  “Of course,” she choked out in response. “And I’ll pull back the curtains as far as they’ll go to let in the daylight.”

  “Yes, yes.” Josh was fishing in his bag for supplies. “Has he been conscious at all?”

  “A few times, but only briefly.”

  Travis and Peter had left and it was up to Percy to report on Troy’s condition and care. She lit the light at the side of her bed and
scraped the table across the floor closer to Josh.

  “I have two more lamps in the kitchen,” Percy said. “I’ll get them.”

  Josh nodded but did not speak. His fingers gently probed the wound. When Percy returned with the extra lamps, he said, “You did a good job cleaning up the wound.”

  “Peter and Travis did that,” Percy quickly clarified. “I just brought them water and clean rags.”

  Josh’s eyes went briefly to the pile of blood-soaked rags in the corner of Percy’s bedroom. The bedding was streaked with blood and the mud caked on Troy’s clothing. Her counted cross stitch throw pillow was tossed haphazardly on the floor in the far corner. Travis and Peter had repositioned her trunk in order to sit on it, and when Josh arrived, he had shoved it out of the way. Now it sat cockeyed across the center of the room.

  “I’m sure this is not quite the décor you had in mind for this room,” he said.

  Percy shrugged. “It’ll clean up.” Hours ago, she had resigned herself to the reality of what was happening, bizarre as it was.

  “You’re being a good sport about this invasion of your home.”

  Percy laughed. “I didn’t really have a choice.” She was caught off guard by Josh’s reference to her room as her home for she had not yet come to think of it in that way. Although she had nowhere else to go, no other place to call home, and had no plans for leaving, she had not thought of this room as “home” in her own mind. Would she ever? Would she ever know the feeling of being at home again?

  “It’s a good thing he’s unconscious,” Josh said. “This is going to hurt.”

  “What if he wakes up?” Percy asked, suddenly panicked.

  “Let’s pray he doesn’t. And if he does, we’ll use ether. Look in my bag for a small pair of scissors,” Josh instructed. “I’m going to start stitching. I’ll need you to help cut every now and then. Get in here as close as you can so you can see what I’m doing, but don’t block the light.”

  “But I’m not…I’ve never—”

  “Percy, I need your help.”

  Josh’s tone was clear. He was not leaving her any choice, any more than she had had a choice about any of the day’s events so far. Swallowing hard, she knelt on the floor next to him, feeling his shoulder against hers.

  Josh worked on the wound and Percy hardly breathed as she watched him sew the gaping hole together, layer by layer. At his instruction she snipped, cleaned, adjusted the light, wiped his brow.

  Finally, they finished. Josh rocked back off his knees and sat on the floor cross-legged. He held his bloodied hands carefully out away from his body.

  “Here,” Percy said, thrusting a pot of water toward him. It was no longer hot, but at least Josh could rinse off. “I’ll heat some more.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Percy put another pot of water on the stove. She returned to find Josh shaking the water off his hands and she handed him a clean towel.

  “You could use some of this water yourself,” he said.

  For the first time, Percy looked at her own hands and clothing. The dress was a dark one and perhaps the blood stains would not show too badly after it was washed.

  “I’m sorry about all this mess,” Josh said.

  “It’s not your fault. I’m just glad you got here.”

  “I wish I had been here sooner. I could have made my rounds tomorrow.”

  “You can’t possibly know when something is going to happen here. I heard you went to check on a pregnant woman.”

  He nodded. “She’s fine, but her time is getting close.”

  “You did the right thing to go.”

  “I’m going to insist that Peter begin building the medical clinic he’s been promising. He must start right away.”

  “Even if you had a clinic,” Percy pointed out, “you would have been away.”

  “Perhaps. But you and Peter and Travis would have had a proper place to take Troy and the right supplies to help him until I got there. People have to know where to find help. Matt could have taken Troy straight to the clinic. And I need proper working conditions for situations like this.” He gestured around. “Bright lights, a place to operate, a bed where a patient can recover and I can stay close.”

  A groan coming from the bed snatched their attention. Percy watched, her own eyes wide, as Troy opened his eyes and stared at her. “What’s she doing here?” Troy asked gruffly.

  Josh looked at Percy. “Has he spoken before?”

  She shook her head. “This is the first time.”

  Josh turned back to Troy. “You should be thankful she’s here. She’s been very conscientious about taking care of you.”

  “I didn’t ask her to.”

  “You were not in a position to ask anybody anything,” Josh said harshly. “Just be grateful someone was around to look after you.”

  “That’s your job,” Troy muttered.

  “You’ve been unconscious a long time,” Josh said. “This is one time when you don’t need an argument.”

  “What happened to my leg? It’s throbbing with pain.”

  “The wound was very deep and I had to sew it back together. I’m hopeful for a full recovery.”

  “Where am I?” Troy grunted.

  “In Miss Morgan’s room, behind the mess hall,” Josh informed him. “Another reason why you should be grateful to her.”

  “I want to get out of here.”

  Josh shook his head. “Oh, no. You’re not going anywhere for quite a while.”

  Percy’s heart lurched. What did Josh mean? Surely he was not going to leave Troy Wilger in her bedroom!

  Josh looked at Percy. “I’m sorry, Percy. But he’s very, very weak. I can’t move him for several days, maybe even a week.”

  She gulped. “So you want him to stay here? In my room?”

  Josh nodded. “I realize it’s an extreme inconvenience, and I’ll do my best to make it up to you. I’m not sure where we’ll take him for the recovery period he’s going to need, but at least for the time being, he must stay here. I’ll stay with him much of the time, of course.”

  “But…but…” Percy could not put words around the cloud of feelings that swirled inside her mind. Joshua’s reasons for usurping her room were quite legitimate, but to have the only private space she had taken from her seemed equally unreasonable.

  “You can stay in my room at Lacey’s house,” Josh explained, as if reading her thoughts. “You can move in over there right now, if you want to. Plan to stay a few days. Travis can explain to Lacey, if he hasn’t already. I’m sure she’ll understand.”

  Percy hardly knew what to say.

  “Why don’t you get a few things together,” Josh said softly, “at least enough for tonight. You can always come back for whatever you need.”

  Of course Josh was right, Percy told herself. What he suggested made perfect sense. She looked from Joshua to Troy, who was drifting back to sleep.

  “Just take what you need,” Josh repeated. “Don’t worry about the mess. I promise it won’t be here in the morning. Just go on over to Lacey’s.”

  Percy gasped. “Oh, no! I was supposed to go to Lacey’s hours ago. She invited me for the afternoon with the other women. I made a pie to take.”

  “You could still take it.”

  Percy glanced at the clock, suddenly mindful of time. “I barely have time to make supper for the men. They’ll be here before I know it.”

  “I wish there were someone else who could do that for you,” Josh said gently. “You must be exhausted.” Josh’s weary face, lined with worry about Troy Wilger, nevertheless looked at Percy with sincere concern.

  Percy’s knees were weak, her stomach lurching, her head pounding. Yes, she was exhausted. “I’ll be fine,” she said a little stiffly. “I’ll check on that hot water so you can clean up properly. Then I’ve got to get back to work.”

  Chapter 14

  Percy thought the men would never finish the biscuits and sausage gravy she had hastily thrown togeth
er for supper. Since she usually served that meal for breakfast, she got a few strange looks as men came through the line. But she had needed something that she could make without thinking, without calculating or multiplying ingredients. Finally, the last dishes were cleaned up and put away. Percy was exhausted.

  Little noise emanated from the back room while she worked in the kitchen. Every so often she would hear the shuffle of Joshua’s feet as he moved across the room and checked on Troy more closely. She had taken them food while the men ate. Troy was too weak to sit up for very long, but he ate hungrily and gratefully before dropping off to sleep again. Now Percy remembered that she had not gone back in to collect their dishes. Wiping her hands on her apron, she entered her bedroom-turned-clinic.

  “I came for the dishes,” she said softly, picking them up.

  “I’m sorry,” Josh responded. His haggard face showed the strain of the day. “I should have brought them out to you. I guess I dozed off myself.”

  “It’s no problem. But I finished all the others, so I think I’ll leave these till the morning.”

  “The biscuits were superb. I can see why the men like your cooking.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Troy is sleeping soundly. When you get your things together, I’ll walk you over to Lacey’s house.”

  “That’s not necessary. I can manage.”

  “I’d like to do it.”

  Percy started to protest further, but stopped. He was looking at her with his clear, honest brown eyes and she believed him. “All right. I’ll just be a few minutes.”

  Percy left the dishes in the sink, soaking, and tried to focus on what she would need overnight at Lacey’s house. Opening up her trunk and extracting a nightgown and other personal items was awkward, although Josh discreetly kept his eyes turned in another direction. Percy quickly picked up a clean dress—she still wore the blood-soaked one—and her hairbrush, stuffed everything in a pillowcase, and announced she was ready to go.

  Josh stood up wearily.

  “You really should stay here,” Percy said. “You’re dead on your feet. Anyone can see that.”