“Your instructor was a romantic.” Sophie draped her arm across her middle in attempts to ease her indigestion with a hug.
“He doctored in literature, actually. The story came from a Greek or Roman myth. I can’t remember which one.” Chad’s hand came to rest on the sleeve of her dress. He walked his fingers down her arm in a tickling motion.
An overwhelming urge to retch came upon Sophie. She sprang from the swing and ran from the porch. Chad plodded after her.
“Sophie, what’s wrong?”
Please, please not here. She reached the fence and swallowed air until it made her lightheaded. Fighting against the burning sensation in her chest, she whirled around and thrust her hand out to prevent Chad from coming any closer.
“You’re pale.” His eyes widened. “And you’re perspiring.”
“I don’t feel well.” She spoke in breathy syncopation as cramps constricted her abdomen.
Chad backed away from her. “I’ll go get your parents.” He stumbled as he turned to go inside the house.
Sophie made a beeline for her family’s wagon. Using the back frame to hoist herself, she scrambled inside. Next to the rifle, her father kept a wooden crate in the corner containing hooks, canvas tarp, and a canteen. She threw back the lid and lifted the canteen out, hurrying to unscrew the top. Lukewarm water spilled over her hands. She tilted the canteen up to her mouth and poured it down her throat.
It tasted wretched, of salt, old leather, and bitter metal, but she drained the contents dry, until her stomach seemed to be temporarily appeased.
Her mother dashed out the door of the mayor’s house, trailed by her father and Mayor Hooper. The three of them came to the side of the wagon. “Sophie, Chad said you were ill. What’s happened?”
The nausea came in a small wave. Sophie’s lips trembled in fear that it would escalate again. “I must go home. Now.” She tolerated her mother laying a hand across her forehead.
“She’s warm. I’ll get the rest of the children and tell your wife that we have to leave, Mayor.”
“I’ll let her know. Stay out here with your daughter.” Mayor Hooper returned inside the house.
Sophie’s father untethered the horses and got onto the wagon. “What did you do?”
“I don’t know, Daddy.” Sophie sat on the wagon floor and dabbed her face with a handkerchief. “It came on all of a sudden. I think it was what I ate.”
“Do not let Mrs. Hooper hear you say that.” Her mother got in the wagon beside her and fanned her face.
Sophie kept her eyes closed until her siblings could be heard approaching the wagon. As they climbed in, she heard her parents speaking with the Hoopers. Everyone’s voice faded in and out as she put all her focus on willing herself not to be sick in front of them.
The wagon began to move. Its jostling and bumping along the uneven dirt road put her in dangerous proximity to losing control. The water that she consumed to abate her illness now sloshed about inside like bilge within a ship’s hull.
Her mother never ceased fanning her, though the air she moved with her hand was minimal. “Try to be at ease, Sophie. We’ll be home soon.”
CHAPTER 20
D USTY KNEW WHEN to count his blessings, and this evening he had another one to add to the list. He was Zephyr Ranch’s newest cowhand.
After two hours of answering Mabrey’s questions about his previous work and experience with cattle, along with several demonstrations of his ability to turn a herd, separate a bull from the nursing cows, and run down a calf to rope it, he walked away with a deep sense of accomplishment. The only thing left to do was notify Mr. Charlton of his pending departure.
“Take the time you need to tie up loose ends with your old boss,” Mabrey said. “How long do you think it’ll be?”
“No more than a few days. The plantin’s all done for the spring.” Work never ended where crops and livestock were involved, but Dusty took solace in that he completed the majority of the large tasks set out before him. “I just need to clear my effects from the bunkhouse and see if my employer needs me to do anything else.”
“Be here by the middle of next week, then. It’s almost time to separate the older calves from their mothers. We’ll be branding after that.”
Dusty left the ranch at a quarter past seven after Joe congratulated him and the other cowhands gave him a friendly welcome. He had just enough daylight to get through town and back to the farm. Along the way, he rehearsed how he was going to tell Mr. Charlton about his new job. No matter how he said it, it was going to look like he chose to leave because of what took place concerning his friendship with Sophie. He’d have a hard time explaining that wasn’t the main reason for his actions when it was what finally drove him to do something.
“Can’t be helped, can it, Gabe?” He patted the stallion’s muscular shoulder. “A man’s gotta make a livin’.”
He hoped Mr. Charlton would understand. The worst thing a man could leave a job with was bad standing with his employer.
Dusty reached his destination after eight o’clock, allowing Gabe to stretch his legs and run from the edge of town to the farm. He spotted the Charlton wagon pulled up by the front of the house. Sophie’s father and her brother David were busy unharnessing the horses. They were home awfully early from dining at the mayor’s.
“How was the dinner, Mr. Charlton?”
Sophie’s father had removed his jacket and draped it over the porch banister while he took the yoke apart. “Sophie fell ill. We had to leave early.”
Tension took hold of Dusty and twisted his insides into a knot. Sophie didn’t look sick when he last saw her. “Do you need me to run and get Dr. Gillings?”
“Not just yet. We’ll see how she does in the morning. Her mother’s with her now.”
Dusty had a dozen questions about the specifics of her malady, how she had taken ill all of a sudden, but judging from Mr. Charlton’s brief explanations, no answers were going to come tonight. “If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”
Sophie’s father removed the pole straps from the horses’ legs, not answering. His son kept quiet while he assisted. Dusty rode into the barn and had Gabe unsaddled, rubbed down, and fed before Mr. Charlton talked again.
“Did you go into town tonight?” The two of them left the barn.
“I did. There’s something I need to tell you, but it can wait until your daughter gets better.” Dusty’s anticipation about the new job and his anxiety about telling his boss ebbed away as he considered Sophie’s questionable state of health. He’d promised Mabrey that he’d be back at the ranch in a few days, but now he wasn’t so enthusiastic to leave.
Sophie spent the night in a fevered state. Between chills that drove her burrowing under the covers and vicious sweats that made her toss them over the foot of the bed just as easily, her stomach did things. Horrible, unspeakable things, so that when morning came, she vowed never to eat oysters again for the rest of her life.
Her mother slept in the room with her, leaving only to go downstairs to prepare breakfast. Sophie smelled the bacon grease that was used to fry the griddlecakes and whimpered as another bout of nausea roiled through her empty belly.
Her mother returned with a pot of weak tea and a bowl of watered-down porridge. Sophie waved them away. “If you can’t stomach anything, I’ll have to send for the physician.”
Sophie rolled over on her side and stared listlessly at the wall. Her head pounded when she lifted it in order to push the damp cowl of hair off her neck.
“Very well.” Her mother took the tea and porridge back downstairs.
She heard voices from the first floor just before falling into a light sleep. Only a minute or two seemed to have passed when she opened her eyes again to the din of louder voices coming from below. Her mother sounded agitated.
“What’s this? I sent for your father, Dorothea.”
“Yes, Mrs. Charlton, but my father had to remain in his office because of a patient who accidentally shot himself in the knee. He thought I could tend to Sophie by myself.”
“My daughter is very ill, young lady. I won’t tolerate any imitations of doctoring upon her.”
“I can assure you, ma’am, that I have completed all of my training and am fully licensed to practice medicine in the state of Kansas.”
Sophie drifted into an odd daze where she was neither asleep nor fully conscious. She regained lucidity to find both her mother and Dr. Dorothea Gillings standing over her.
“How are you feeling, Sophie? Mrs. Charlton tells me that you had something to eat for supper last night that didn’t agree with you.”
“I didn’t say supper,” her mother defended. “It had to have happened before the fact. Mrs. Hooper prepared a beautiful supper for us yesterday. No one else in this house has felt the unpleasant effects of what my daughter’s experienced.”
Sophie murmured, “Oysters.”
Dr. Dorothea leaned over the bed to hear. “Was that oysters, you said?”
It was a great labor to open her eyes, let alone speak. “I had oyster stuffing for supper. I know that’s what caused my suffering. I barely touched anything else on my plate.”
“She’s saying it was the oysters, Mrs. Charlton. I have to go by her word.”
Her mother fussed at Dr. Dorothea again. She rested her eyelids while listening.
“Explain why the rest of us aren’t sick then. We all tried the stuffing.”
“She may possess a sensitivity to it. Such cases are documented.”
“Nonsense. Sophie ate oysters all the time in Louisiana.”
“Well, where did Mrs. Hooper get the oysters?”
She heard the door to the bedroom close. Her mother’s voice was farther away. “She said they were brought in by train from St. Louis.”
“How long were they on the train? How long ago had they been caught?” A small weight dropped onto the bed. A parcel or valise of some sort.
“Why would I think to ask such a question to my dinner hostess, young lady?”
“I ask because the food may have spoiled during the journey.”
Sophie felt the weight of the bed shift again. She opened her eyes to find Dr. Dorothea seated on the edge beside her, going through the contents of a medical bag. The lady’s face was set in a much-utilized mold of patience, although telltale lines of irritation lined her mouth. She put her back to Sophie’s mother.
“How much of the oyster stuffing did you eat?”
Sophie illustrated using her hands. “Two palmfuls. It gave me a fever too.”
The doctor turned to address her mother. “Maybe you didn’t share in any of the symptoms because your portion of oysters wasn’t as large.”
Sophie wished she hadn’t said that. Now her mother would blame the condition on gluttony.
“Mrs. Charlton, could I trouble you for some boiled water?” Dr. Dorothea asked as she withdrew a long-handled syringe from her bag.
Sophie thought she might faint. What was Dr. Dorothea planning on doing with that wicked-looking instrument? She almost cried out for her mother to remain in the bedroom, but the door had already closed.
“Relax, Sophie. You just had some tainted food last night. The worst consequences are probably over.”
“Then why do you have that syringe?”
“This?” Dr. Dorothea grasped the instrument between her fingers as another woman would a delicate paper fan. “It isn’t to administer you an injection. I’m going to give you a few doses of paregoric to take. I just have to extract it from one bottle to another. This syringe keeps me from spilling it.” She demonstrated by removing a brown bottle from her bag and a smaller blue one.
“What do you need boiled water for?”
“I thought you might want some hot tea after you take this.” Dr. Dorothea glanced at the door with a tiny smile. “And your mother needed something to occupy herself.”
Sophie giggled. “She’d have a fit if she knew the real reason why you sent her downstairs.”
“I understand she worries. What mother wouldn’t for her child? But being female doesn’t make me an incompetent doctor.”
Sophie watched Dorothea transfer the paregoric. In the years that she lived in Assurance, she had known of Dr. and Mrs. Gillings’ only daughter, but rarely had the chance to speak with her. Dorothea was a few years older than she, of a quiet disposition, sharp-minded and studious. Even before going to medical school, her nose was always in a textbook. Sophie never could find a subject to converse with her on without feeling intimidated or unknowledgeable.
“My mother meant no harm.”
“She was expecting my father. Everyone does when they call for Dr. Gillings.”
Sophie attempted to sound helpful. “You can change your name when you get married.”
Dorothea glanced at her as though the suggestion was just too precious for words. “Bless your heart, but I worked hard to become a doctor. I won’t have a man telling me that I must give up my practice in order to take his name.”
“You mean you don’t want a husband?”
“Not unless he accepts me for who I am.”
“There aren’t very many gentlemen whose wives are physicians.”
With the blue bottle filled, Dorothea stuck a dropper into it and administered four drops of the medicine to Sophie.
“Precisely, and I don’t intend to devote the rest of my life to feeding a man’s confidence, assuring him constantly that he’s more intelligent than I am. Take another four drops of this in the afternoon. It might make you sleepy.”
Sophie swallowed the peculiar-tasting medicine. It wasn’t bitter or syrupy sweet, but it soothed her stomach going down. “Dr. Dorothea, how do you feel about women voting?”
“Besides the fact that almost every town allows it but ours?”
It was the answer she was looking for. “I have a petition that I want people to sign allowing for us to vote in this year’s election. It’s only for school ballots, but it’s a start. Would you care to add your name to the list?”
Dorothea withdrew a slim case containing a thermometer from her bag. She swabbed it in a tube of alcohol before placing it under Sophie’s tongue. “I’ll sign. Where is it? Point. Don’t try to speak while the mercury measures your temperature.”
Sophie ind
icated for her to open the first drawer on the bedside table. Dorothea turned the first page. “My, my. Look at Mr. Hooper’s signature. I thought I saw his name on our Constitution too, if I’m not mistaken.”
The thermometer kept Sophie from laughing. After five minutes, the doctor read her temperature.
“You still have a fever. I’ll leave some of the tea with willow bark extract that my father likes to treat his patients with.”
“Thank you, Dr. Dorothea. For signing my petition too.”
Dorothea returned all her medical equipment into the bag. In the process of packing the thermometer case, she paused and studied Sophie. “I never thought for a moment that you would turn out to be a suffragist.”
Sophie sank into the pillows, grateful for the medicine beginning to work its miracles on her queasiness. “I wouldn’t call myself that. It all started when I needed a cause after winning the town belle contest.”
“But you do think we ladies have the right to make our own choices?”
“I have, since I’ve become so involved. My mother and father tried to stop me at first.”
Dorothea grasped the handle on her bag. “How old are you, Sophie?” Her question was a request for fact, but it sounded accusatory.
“Twenty-one.”
At that, the doctor’s brows went up. “Twenty-one is a good age to start making your own decisions.”
Sophie defended herself and her parents. “I wasn’t raised to be disrespectful. They didn’t want me to be entangled in politics. They meant well.”
“You can be respectful while still defending what you believe in. If you want to get more names on that petition, you’re going to have to show people that you can do that.”
A Windswept Promise Page 18
