“We did,” Sylvia Quinn said with a tremor in her voice. “Elmer saw the smoke from our west field and we came as fast as we could. She was already out here.”
“Was she awake? Did she cough?”
“Coughed something terrible at first, the poor thing,” Mrs. Quinn said, a little sob tearing from her throat. “Like she couldn’t get any air. I didn’t know what to do for her.”
One of the other women cried softly, then turned and looked Caleb over skeptically. “Is she gonna die?”
Caleb turned Joanna on her side and pounded her back as hard as he dared. Someone behind him gasped.
Joanna coughed and gagged up black mucus. With his heart pounding frantically, he breathed a grateful sigh and eased her to her back. Efficiently squeezing ointment onto gauze pads, he covered her face and hands loosely, trying to distance himself from the patient. He worked at trying not to think of her tears the day her husband had died or of her grief when she’d seen her lifeless baby. Getting too close to his patient wouldn’t allow him the level head he needed to think and work.
“She doesn’t look good, Mrs. Douglas,” he answered finally—and frankly. “I’m going to take her back to town with me.” At the same time he tried to see Joanna Bowman as a patient who needed his medical training and his clearheaded decisions, he wondered what he would do with a patient in this serious a condition in his small, rented office.
Elmer Quinn helped Caleb lift Joanna into the back of the wagon, using the blanket as a stretcher. Caleb fought the apprehension that gripped him. What if she didn’t recover?
He looked up into pale gray eyes swimming with tears. Clella had endured many of the same hardships as Joanna. They were neighbors, friends. With a pained look of regret in her eyes, she stepped away from the wagon.
Caleb’s worried gaze took in the neighboring farmers. One by one, they turned away and started back to their homes. Resignedly, he climbed into the wagon bed and settled beside the badly injured woman.
The wagon rumbled toward town. Caleb shielded Joanna’s loosely bandaged face from the sun with a feed sack. He’d wanted to be a doctor. He’d asked for the responsibility of caring for the health and well-being of the community.
This woman depended on him, and he’d do the best he knew how to see that she pulled through. Caleb studied her still form and fought uncertainty. He’d never doctored anyone this badly burned. He wasn’t certain any treatment would help her.
So much rode on every patient he treated. If she died it would feed the mistrust the community harbored toward him. He wasn’t a miracle worker. And that was what he’d have to be to prove himself to the people of Newton.
Gazing skyward, he prayed for a miracle. What if he couldn’t save her, either?
He got help carrying Joanna up the stairs and placing her on the bed in his office. He treated the burns methodically, knowing they were not the problem. The smoke and heat she’d inhaled had damaged her lungs, and he knew of no way to correct that.
It was a blessing that she remained unconscious. Even when he pounded her back to force up the black mucus, she fortunately remained unaware. He made sure she stayed that way by giving her laudanum every few hours.
He glanced over at the cot he’d purchased and set up in case he ever needed to stay the night. It looked as if he’d be staying.
He hadn’t thought about food, about leaving, about anything except seeing to Joanna’s care since he’d brought her here, so the sound of footsteps on his stairs brought him back to reality.
The door opened, and his silver-haired mother, in one of her best dresses and hats, entered his office, a flannel-wrapped bundle in her arms.
“Mother!” he said with surprise. His father followed on her heels, a handsome figure in his fashionable serge suit.
“When you didn’t come to the ranch for Nate, I got worried,” his mother said with a frown.
“I’m sorry. There was a fire today. Joanna Bowman is here. I’ve been working on her burns and trying to make her comfortable.”
“Oh, how awful,” his mother said, clucking sympathetically.
Caleb crossed the distance and took his three-month-old son from her arms. “Hello, little man. Were you missing your daddy?”
The blue-eyed baby smiled a toothless smile. Caleb’s heart constricted with the painful reminder of his blue-eyed wife.
“We have the cattlemen’s dinner tonight, Caleb,” his father prompted from near the doorway.
“And we’re going to Florence to visit Patricia tomorrow,” his mother added. “I reminded you yesterday.”
“You did,” he agreed, “and I didn’t see a problem until this happened.”
His mother eased toward the door. “Well, it’s too late to make any other arrangements now.”
It dawned on him then that his parents intended to depart and leave Nate here with him. “Wait a minute.”
His mother brushed lint from the front of her smart jade dress. “What, darling?”
They had been nothing but helpful since Leila’s death. His mother kept Nate nearly every day while Caleb ran his practice. Their own children were grown and gone, and she’d passed middle age years ago. She and his father deserved this time to spend with each other, and with the other ranchers, to go visiting if they chose. He couldn’t bring himself to object to their leaving his own son with him.
They’d wanted him to take over the running of the ranch. All he’d ever wanted was to be able to heal people. He’d made his choice in choosing a profession that demanded his time and energy, and he had to accept the consequences.
His sister, Patricia, wanted Nate to come live with her, and she made no secret of her desire to raise him. Caleb knew the boy needed a mother. But Nate was the only part of Leila he had left, and he loved him. He couldn’t give him up. He would have to make do, no matter how difficult.
“Have a good time.” He managed a more gracious sentiment than he felt.
Three hours, four diapers and a regurgitated bottle of goat’s milk later, he placed the sleeping Nate on the cot and checked on Joanna. She had a fever and her breathing was so shallow he had to check her pulse to assure himself she still lived. He cleaned and rebandaged her burns and, with stoical persistence, succeeded in getting some water through her blistered lips and down her throat.
He’d never spent a longer night than the one that followed.
The next afternoon, Ellie climbed the stairs to Dr. Chaney’s office. That noon in the hotel kitchen, she’d heard the talk spreading through Newton that the young doc had a seriously injured patient to tend. Skeptics were taking bets on how long the woman could hang on. The doctor wouldn’t have had any time to inquire about a job for Ellie, so she’d decided to pay him a call and see if he could direct her somewhere. Perhaps he’d need some help himself today.
She knocked on the door and waited. It opened a moment later. The rumpled young doctor stood before her wearing the same clothing he’d worn the day before. His cheeks showed a day’s growth of reddish brown stubble, and his hair looked as though he’d run his fingers through it in lieu of a brush.
But more startling than the abrupt change from his previously impeccable appearance was the infant cradled in the crook of his white-sleeved arm. Her curiosity at the flannel-wrapped baby wasn’t easy to hide.
Ellie stared at the tall, dark-haired doctor and the rosy-cheeked baby who frowned owlishly and blinked back, a glistening drop hanging from his lower lip.
“Miss Parrish,” the doctor said, stepping back. “Is your arm all right?”
“Well, it’s still broken. But it’s no worse.” She glanced around, noting the curtained-off section she knew hid the bed, amazed that his first thought had been concern for her. “How’s your patient?”
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, demonstrating how he had achieved its disheveled appearance. “Not good.”
She could plainly see how difficult this was for him. “I’m sorry.”
He took note of h
er expression and nodded. “I apologize for running out yesterday. I didn’t realize until later that I hadn’t excused myself or even said a word to you.”
“You had to think of the supplies you needed. I didn’t think a thing of it, honestly. I appreciated the way you took care of me right away. I’m sure your other patients do, too.”
He made no comment, probably wondering why she’d come.
“I came to offer help.”
He stared at her curiously, and she wondered if she’d said the wrong thing. She hadn’t meant to offend him.
“I heard about your patient. I can’t work at the hotel, as you know, and I didn’t have anything to do. I thought perhaps…” The thought faded away. Coming here had been a foolish thing to do. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking.” She turned toward the door.
“No, wait!”
Slowly, she turned back.
“I do need help.”
Ellie’s gaze swept the healthy-looking infant. He had wispy dark hair and a cherubic pink mouth and darling nose. He leaned back in the crook of the doctor’s arm and stared up at his father, his eyelids growing heavy.
“I forgot to make arrangements for Nate while my parents went out of town. Do you know anything about babies?”
The child’s eyes had closed, his lashes lying against his rosy cheeks. His relaxed fists lay nearly touching his ears. Her heart contracted. Against her will, she thought of other babies, remembered cries and curses and the sick, indescribable, suffocating feeling of being a part of something unspeakable…and the terror of being helpless.
A wave of shame gripped Ellie’s vitals for a full thirty seconds, and she feared she’d either cry or throw up. Pain so great she worried she’d never be able to keep it buried rose in her heart and squeezed the breath from her.
Immediately, she dropped her gaze to the floor and willed her emotions into control. She could never let anyone see she carried a burden so dark and ugly there was no hope for it.
“Miss Parrish?”
She had a purpose, and she was a strong person, not given to fits of emotion or moved by attacks of regret.
“Miss Parrish?”
Miss “Parrish” was a continual reminder to her that she wasn’t who he thought she was.
“You can call me Ellie.” Even her voice was strong.
“Okay…Ellie.”
Her real name on his lips made her heart catch oddly, and she tamped down her reaction. She raised her gaze to his warm brown eyes and hated the flutter in her chest.
“Could you take care of Nate for a few days…maybe a few weeks?” he asked.
Ellie glanced from his earnest face to the baby and back, wondering with a little jolt of apprehension where his line of thinking was headed.
“I didn’t sleep last night,” he said. “Joanna requires all my attention right now. And with Nate…well, I can’t neglect either one.”
Ellie nodded, whether in understanding or in recognition of what was coming, she didn’t know.
“I’d be willing to pay for your services while you’re unable to work in the dining hall. It doesn’t take a whole lot of experience to learn to change and feed him. And if you should have any problems, I can help you.”
Experience? Ellie’d had enough experience taking care of babies and children to last her a lifetime. She hadn’t planned to do it again. Ever.
“He’s not heavy. I’m sure you can manage with one arm.”
She could do it blindfolded with one arm, Ellie thought, not too graciously. “I don’t know, Dr.—”
“I’ll pay you. Whatever you were making at the Arcade. More. You can work for me until your arm is healed and you’re able to go back to work.”
Exactly the opportunity she needed. But not the job she’d hoped for. Ellie made the crucial mistake of letting herself look at the baby again. His bow-shaped mouth made tiny sucking motions. So helpless. So small and yet so demanding. Dr. Chaney wouldn’t ask this if he knew her. He wouldn’t ask if he knew her family. He wouldn’t ask if he knew about another defenseless little baby….
The doctor sat tiredly on his desk chair then, shifting the infant to his lap so that his head lay cradled in the man’s huge palm. The tenderness in that movement, in the way he looked down at his son, shot something raw and painful through Ellie’s chest. Neither of her brothers had ever had an adult concerned for their well-being.
He looked up. “Am I expecting too much?” he asked. “It’s a lot to ask to care for a stranger’s child—”
“No,” she replied, cutting him off. “I can handle him.” Her mind raced with questions. “I don’t know about doing his laundry,” she thought aloud, glancing at her bruised fingers.
“I send the laundry out,” he said simply.
“Oh.”
“I’ll get you a room at the boardinghouse for the time being,” he said. “Since you can’t stay in the dormitory while you aren’t working at the hotel. All his things are at my house, and I keep a goat for his milk. You can stay there with him during the day—well you’ll probably have to stay there until Joanna…until this situation is resolved.”
She nodded, not willing to question this stroke of luck. Not only would this situation relieve her of having to pay for her room and board after next week, but she would make additional money in the meantime! Ellie didn’t see how she could turn down such a proposal. She made up her mind with a new spark of determination. “I’ll take care of him until my arm is healed and I can go back to the dining hall.”
The infant roused and puckered his forehead in a scowl. He found his fist and noisily sucked on his knuckles.
“Looks like he’s hungry—again,” the doctor said. “I’ll run over to Mrs. Ned’s and rent you a room. Her place is clean. Do you have much to move over there?”
She shook her head.
He stood and crossed the room. “Here’s a bottle for him.”
Ellie stood, unprepared to be left alone with Nate so soon. She glanced from the doctor’s somewhat relieved expression to the baby, whose face was rapidly growing red. She hoped he was hungry and that his displeasure wasn’t an indication of her new charge’s temperament.
What had she gotten herself into? She didn’t even want children of her own; caring for someone else’s was bound to wear her down. “I can go to my room later and pack a bag,” she said in acquiescence.
“You can do that after he’s fed and I get back,” he said matter-of-factly, rising with the baby. She expected him to drop the baby into her arm now that she’d agreed to the task, and prepared herself, but he seemed inclined to keep him cradled against his chest. “Can you make a list for me to drop off at the mercantile? I’ll have the things you need delivered.”
She nodded. Ellie had never met a man like Dr. Chaney. Yes, he had the gentle, caring bedside manner one would hope for in a doctor, but he also showed an even, good-natured temperament and was the most agreeable man she’d ever known in her limited, but jaded experience.
Dr. Chaney finally handed her Nate. His minimal weight rested comfortably against her breast, and she looked down into his tiny innocent features. Nothing in the world compared to the delicate feel and smell of a baby. Against her will, against everything she’d told herself and believed, something inside her instinctively softened and stretched toward the infant she cradled. Tears stung her throat and she had to clamp her lips in a tight line to keep them from quivering.
Blinking rapidly, she followed the doctor to the door, experiencing a moment of panic.
“I’ll be right back with a room key,” he said. “I doubt that Joanna will even make a move or a sound. She’s resting as comfortably as I can make her right now.”
Ellie met his eyes. He’d be right back. All she had to do was give Nate a bottle during his absence. She nodded with more confidence than she felt.
He left, closing the door behind him.
Ellie looked down into the baby’s trusting blue eyes. Her lack of confidence wasn’t in
her ability to meet Nate’s needs. Far from that. She didn’t doubt she could take care of him properly. This baby would flourish under her care. The only one at risk here was Ellie herself. She reinforced the chinks in her armor with a deep breath.
Against her better judgment, she slowly raised him, slowly lowered her face to Nate’s downy head, and with her heart beating in her throat, breathed in the unique smell of him.
Her eyes closed, and a deep-seated, never-forgotten ache blossomed afresh in her heart.
What had she done?
Chapter Three
Just as the doctor had predicted, the badly injured woman never moved. In the silence, Nate sucked his fist noisily. Ellie warmed him a bottle, propped him on a table with a blanket at his back and fed him, gazing into his trusting blue eyes.
Though he was a healthier and sturdier infant than she had ever held and fed, he was still so helpless, so defenseless and completely reliant on someone to love and care for him. That utter dependence frightened Ellie, who’d seen and experienced things no child ever should. Things no adult ever should.
She studied his chubby cheeks and the creases at his wrists and elbows, comparing him to the scrawny babies her siblings had been. Resentment built in her anew, but she banished it with the discipline she’d established to retain her sanity.
Nate might be well-fed and clothed, but he’d lost a mother, she reminded herself.
“I’m sorry about your mama, little fellow,” she said with a catch in her chest. “If she’d lived…I wonder if she would have loved you. I wonder if she would have sung lullabies and held you close.”
One corner of the infant’s wet mouth released the rubber nipple and quirked into a smile. Her heart softened. He made a gurgling sound and reached for her face. Ellie slipped a finger into his fist and he clung tightly. Tears burned behind her eyes.
She remembered Benjamin as a baby…Flynn…a sister once, too. The child had been born after Benjamin, had slept beside Ellie on a pile of rags on the floor. A cold winter and lack of food had exposed them all to sickness, and the baby girl hadn’t been strong enough to survive.
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