by Keli Gwyn
“So fast.” Doc’s murmur was barely audible over the labored breathing in the room. “My brother said it moved fast, but I’ve never seen anything like this. Yesterday morning, these boys were hale and hearty.”
Meghan wrung out yet another cloth and swapped it for the one on Harold’s brow. “Tell me these are the worst, that the other soldiers are faring better.”
Doc’s breath puffed out his mask, and he shook his head. “I wish I could. Step out in the hallway with me for a moment.”
Once in the hall, he tugged down his mask. “Jeremy, watch this room while Miss Thorson takes a break.”
The bellhop put down the tray of glasses he carried and nodded. Meghan dropped onto a bench and leaned back. Red streaks of light showed through the filmy curtains on the balcony doors, harbingers of sundown. She’d spent all night and all day in the room and beyond noting times of medication, the hours had blurred together. Had it really been more than twenty-four hours since the train had arrived full of sick soldiers?
Doc sat next to her, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We’ve already lost two of them, and a score more are critical. The one that’s bleeding from the nose…”
“Wesley.” A lump formed in her throat.
“Don’t be surprised if he starts coughing blood soon.”
“What’s happening to them? This isn’t like any flu I’ve ever heard of.”
“Smarter doctors than I seem to think it’s a reaction by the body’s immune system. The flu is a respiratory disease, and when it attacks, the immune system attacks back. Fluids build up in the lungs, and the patient begins to drown. They cough so hard trying to expel the fluids they end up damaging their lung tissue and bleeding into their lungs. They ultimately die of pneumonia. You saw the blue feet on a couple of those boys? The body is starving the limbs of oxygen in an effort to keep the internal organs alive. Once the illness reaches this stage, death is almost certain.”
He heaved out a sigh. “You need to go downstairs and get something to eat. It’s going to be another long night, and you will need all your strength. When you’ve eaten, take a few minutes to walk along the platform and stretch your legs. Jeremy will watch over your patients.”
With leaden legs and a heavy heart, Meghan dragged downstairs toward the kitchen. Mrs. Gregory sat at one of the tables, her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking. She raised her head when Meghan entered.
“Miss Thorson.” She straightened and smoothed her hair, swiping at her eyes and gathering her composure. “Did you need something?”
Meghan noted her blotchy cheeks and the extra starch in her voice that repelled any comment about her appearance. “Doc sent me downstairs to have something to eat and to get a little fresh air.”
“Fine. Chef’s got sandwiches and cake in the cooler. I’d best go see that the laundry is keeping up.” She pushed away from the table and marched away, her heels tapping briskly.
A yellow piece of paper and an envelope fluttered behind her as she passed, and Meghan stooped to pick it up. A telegram. Without really meaning to, her eyes scanned the brief missive.
WHILE ADVANCING AGAINST THE ENEMY, PRIVATE JASPER GREGORY WAS STRUCK BY SHELL FRAGMENTS IN THE TORSO AND LEG. PRIVATE GREGORY IS RECUPERATING AT THE ARMY FIELD HOSPITAL NEAR THE CITY OF ARRAS. HIS CONDITION IS CONSIDERED CRITICAL. AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, HE WILL BE EVACUATED TO BRITAIN THEN TO THE UNITED STATES.
Meghan’s hand shook. Mrs. Gregory’s son was supposed to be safe behind the lines working for the quartermaster, not advancing against the Germans on the Western Front. She folded the telegram and replaced it in the envelope, unsure what to do. Poor Mrs. Gregory. Her son was all she had.
Her thoughts went to her brother, Lars, praying he was still alive, praying her parents wouldn’t receive a telegram like this. She sank onto a chair and put her face in her hands. Her appetite had fled. Hot tears flooded her eyes, for Mrs. Gregory who held people at arm’s length even in her most sorrow-filled moments, for the soldiers on the front lines, and for the poor soldiers upstairs fighting for their lives. She blinked hard, forcing down her fear and despondency, knowing that if she gave in to her tears now, she’d be useless.
“Ma’am?” The whisper barely penetrated the big empty kitchen.
She turned. Joshua Hualga opened the batwing door wider.
“Joshua, what are you doing here?”
“I’ve been all over this hotel looking for you.” He stuck his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. “What’s going on upstairs? Why isn’t the restaurant open?”
“Does Caleb know you’re here?” She braced her hands on the table and stood.
“No, and I figure he’d skin me alive if he did know. He let me borrow the truck to go visit my family on the reservation, but I figured somebody better come talk to you.”
“Why? Is something wrong with Caleb?” She cast a quick glance over her shoulder. “You’re not supposed to be in the hotel. Let’s get outside before someone sees you.”
His face hardened. “Because I’m an Indian? We went all through that with the man who owns the hotel. I have as much right to be here as anyone.”
“Oh, my stars and garters, boy.” She grabbed his arm, exasperated and tired. “I don’t care if you’re Indian, Greek, or the King of the Cannibal Islands, you can’t be in the hotel. It’s under quarantine.” She hustled him out of the kitchen, through the dining room and foyer, and out onto the railroad platform. “Some passengers came in yesterday who weren’t feeling well. They’re staying here until they get better, and Doc put the hotel into quarantine as a precaution.” She downplayed the severity of the situation, not wanting to scare him.
“Doc’s here? Does he need help?” Light leaped into Joshua’s eyes and he took a step back toward the lobby doors.
She put her hand on his chest. “Doc’s got plenty of help. Now go home.”
“No, ma’am, not till you’ve heard me out. I risked my job to come find you, and I intend to say what I’ve got to say before I go back and own up to what I’ve done.” His jaw stuck out, and his eyes glittered in the dusk. “You were pretty harsh on Caleb when you were out to his place, and it cut him up pretty deep. He’s been like a badger with a boil all week. He was sweet on you, and he thought you were woman enough to stand up to the opinions of this town and take his part. He’s so disappointed in you, he can hardly think straight.”
“He’s disappointed in me?” She gaped. “I’m not the one who earned herself a white feather. I’m not the one who’s so afraid that he won’t enlist.”
Joshua snorted and scowled. “You’re talking through your hat. Caleb isn’t afraid of anything or anyone. Spend just a minute and think back on what he’s done. He threw himself practically under a train to rescue you the first day you met. He hired me when he knew lots of folks in this town wouldn’t spit on an Indian if he was on fire. He stood up to Mr. Stock when he would’ve thrown me out of the hotel for being Indian. He faces down bullies and gossips every time he sets foot in this two-bit burg. He even braved a dance here at the hotel, one hosted by a bunch of cow-faced old gossips who’d like nothing better than to roast him on a spit, just because he wanted to spend more time with you. You don’t know what courage looks like if you think it can only be found in uniform.”
Stung by the vehemence in his tone and the fire in his eyes, she fought back. “Then why won’t he enlist? Why won’t he stand up for himself?”
“His reasons are his own, I reckon, and when he’s ready he’ll tell you. Until then, you should have faith in him. Caleb McBride holds everything in, even his temper, when most men would’ve punched someone or struck back somehow. He’s patient and careful and private, and he tries not to let anything show. He must care for you an awful lot to be so hurt by you turning against him. The whole town has turned against him, and he hasn’t cared a cup of sand what they thought, but you’re different. He let himself care, reached out to you a little, and you bit him like a rattler.”
Before s
he could respond, Mrs. Gregory called out. “You there, boy. Get away from here. Miss Thorson, you’re needed upstairs.”
“Think on what I said.” Joshua stepped back. “And tell Doc that I’d be happy to help out with the sick if he needs me.”
Meghan returned to the hotel under the watchful eye of the head waitress.
“What did he want?” Mrs. Gregory’s voice was loaded with animosity.
Mindful of the terrible news the head waitress had just received, Meghan softened her reply. “He offered to help with the sick if we needed him.”
“Did you tell him we had the influenza here?”
“No, just that some passengers had fallen ill and Doc quarantined the hotel as a precaution against the illness spreading to the town.”
“Fine. Good. Hopefully he’ll stay away. You do need to get back upstairs. We’ve lost two more soldiers, and a couple of the hotel staff aren’t feeling too well.” The lines had deepened around the head waitress’s mouth, and her eyelids were still pink.
Meghan nodded. “You dropped this in the kitchen.” She handed over the yellow envelope, giving no indication she knew the contents. When Mrs. Gregory was ready, she’d let people know of her son’s condition. Until then, Meghan would guard her privacy.
With her chin held high, Mrs. Gregory took the envelope, but the storm clouds of fear gathering in her eyes belied her outward calm.
Meghan returned to room twenty-four and relieved the bellboy. Her patients clung to life by tenuous threads, and she settled in for a long night of nursing care and thinking over what Joshua had said.
Chapter 14
You did what?” Caleb let his saddle thunk to the ground and wiped his forehead. After a day of dust and wind and heat and stubborn horses, his fuse was short. All he wanted to do was get the weight off his leg and drink about a gallon of cool water.
“I went to see Meghan last night.” Joshua tucked his hands into his back pockets and stared at Caleb from under his hat brim, defiance in every line of his thin body.
“I thought you were visiting your parents.”
“I did. But afterward I stopped in town. That’s why I was so late getting back. I’d have told you then, but you’d already gone to bed. And this morning you were in too bad a mood.”
“You had no call to see Meghan.” The initial explosion of surprise in Caleb’s chest grew and rippled outward into anger.
“Didn’t I? You’ve been hissing and snapping around here like a cornered Gila monster all week, ever since she smacked your face. You’re miserable, and you’re taking it out on me. Somebody had to do something about what’s wrong between you two.”
“I have not been a Gila monster, and how I feel has nothing to do with Meghan Thorson. There’s nothing wrong between us.”
“Then why haven’t you gone to town and talked to her?”
“I’ve been busy, and there’s nothing to say.”
“That hasn’t stopped you all summer. How many trips to town did you make just so you could see her? You’re eating your heart out for her, and you’re too stubborn to admit it.”
“Is that what you told her?” He jerked his hat off and thwacked his thigh, lifting his face to the sun. “Somebody save me from interfering friends and gabbity employees.” Curiosity ate at him, and he couldn’t help asking, “What else did you tell her, and what did she say?”
Joshua mopped his face and grimaced. He rolled his neck and shoulders and blinked against the glare. “I told her you were more courageous than anyone I had ever met and that she was a fool to let other people define courage for her.”
He stilled, leaning against the corral rails. Pleasantly surprised, he didn’t know what to say, so he busied himself by coiling and recoiling his rope.
Joshua continued. “I have eyes in my head. I told her to remember all the courageous things you’ve done that you didn’t have to do. About how you do things without thinking about the cost to yourself and that you held onto your temper better than anyone I knew. I just wish you’d tell her the real reason you haven’t enlisted.”
The rope dropped from his hands. “What do you mean?”
Joshua shrugged. “I told you I have eyes. Why don’t you tell her about your leg?”
Cold swept through him. “What about my leg?”
“Can we go sit down in the shade to talk about this? I’m weak as a cat today. Guess staying out late last night didn’t agree with me.” Joshua turned and headed for the porch.
Snatching up his rope, Caleb made sure the corral gate was latched before following him. When they were both seated in the ladder-back chairs on the porch, he stared hard at his employee. “What do you know about my leg?”
Joshua let his head rest against the top slat and closed his eyes. “I know that you limp on it when you think nobody’s looking. I know it pains you, especially after a long day. I figure that’s why you’ve gone to see Doc a few times this summer, and I know that your boots are special made. So what’s wrong with it anyway?”
A lifetime of silence on the issue clamped Caleb’s lips shut. He got up and went into the kitchen, pouring two glasses of water before returning to the porch. Joshua cracked one eyelid and accepted his glass, drinking it in small sips. Caleb returned to his chair and drained the contents of his water glass.
“You done stalling?”
He glared at Joshua, but the gesture was lost on his hired hand. He had his eyes closed again.
“I had…” He could hardly bear to say the words, he loathed them so much. “I had infantile paralysis when I was a kid.” He braced himself for a reaction.
Joshua let out a long breath through his nose and raised his eyelids. “That’s rough. I’ve been reading those books from Doc. I guess it’s a blessing you can walk at all. But why hide it? It’s not like getting sick was your fault.”
The words jammed in his throat. It was so hard to explain, how his damaged leg made him feel less than a man, how he’d been judged and found wanting by the very people who were supposed to love him, who should’ve loved him, infirmity and all.
“I don’t like to talk about it. This bum leg has cost me too much. When people know about it, they treat me like I don’t have any brains, that my head must be as withered as my foot.”
“People like who? Doc knows about it and he treats you just fine. I imagine that major who came to buy the horses must’ve known something about it, and he looked you in the eye and commended your work.”
“They’re the exceptions, trust me.”
“So who treated you bad because of your leg? Nobody else in town knows, or word would’ve spread and they’d have laid off all the coward nonsense.” Joshua was like a crow picking corn off a cob, peck, peck, peck.
“My father stuck me in an asylum for crippled kids and never spoke to me again.” Caleb sucked in a breath and barely avoided putting his hand on his chest. How could a wound so old still hurt like it had just happened?
A phantom smile crossed Joshua’s face. “Your dad and mine sound a lot alike. Mine barely speaks to me and was only too glad to see me leave the reservation to work for you. He doesn’t know what to do with me. I had the audacity to be different.”
Caleb remained silent, leaning forward and bracing his forearms on his thighs, rolling his empty glass between his palms.
“You should tell Meghan at least. She deserves to know. Then she can quit thinking you’re a coward. I bet she’d pin the ears back on any of those nosy biddies in town who wanted to run you down. She’s a sure enough go-getter and smacker-downer when she gets the bit between her teeth. She’d fire up so quick in your defense, she might burn down the town with her words alone.”
“I doubt that.” Her outraged face swam in his memory, her hand lifted to strike his face.
“I have a feeling that once you had Meghan on your side, she’d take a bullet for you.”
“But if she knew about my leg, she wouldn’t be on my side. I can live with her thinking I’m a coward because it isn
’t true. I can’t stomach her turning away from me because I have a crippled leg.”
“What makes you think she’d bail out on you?”
“Bitter experience.”
Joshua raised his eyebrows and took a sip of his water. With the back of his sleeve he mopped his forehead once more. “How so?”
“Nothing to be gained by talking about it.” If there was one wound he didn’t want exposed, it was his failure with Patricia.
“Nothing to be lost either.” Joshua sighed and closed his eyes. “Man, I feel like the dog’s dinner.”
“I’d best go start supper.” He braced his hands on the arms of the rocker and rose.
A grimace twisted the boy’s features. “None for me. I’m going to go to bed.”
Caleb stopped halfway to the door. Not hungry? That wasn’t like Joshua. He reversed direction and laid his hand on the boy’s forehead. Heat radiated from his skin.
“You’re burning up.”
“I think I might’ve done something stupid.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I went to see Meghan…the hotel was under quarantine. I went inside anyway, slipped past the bellhop they had manning the front doors.”
“Quarantine? For what?”
“Meghan didn’t say, but it must be pretty serious if they locked down the hotel and closed the restaurants. From the little bit I saw, I’d venture to say there are a lot of soldiers in the hotel. One of those troop trains. Now I’m thinking going inside wasn’t such a great idea. I feel terrible.”
Sick soldiers. It didn’t take a genius to guess that the Spanish Flu had invaded Needles. The papers had been full of the epidemic for weeks, especially in the military camps.
And Joshua had come into contact with the sickness.
“Let’s get you to bed. Maybe it’s just a touch of heat or something. If you don’t perk up after a good night’s rest, I’m taking you to town.”
Meghan stood in the hallway, her shoulders bowed, tears stinging her eyes and throat, trying to hold on to her self-control. Within a half hour of each other, Wesley and Patrick had succumbed to the dreadful illness. A pair of hotel porters bore Wesley away on a stretcher, just as they had Patrick only a little while before. George and Harold clung to life, racked with coughing and fever, but still alive.
