“I... I’m sorry,” Thorn murmured. “I didn’t mean to make you sad.”
She hadn’t even noticed the tears that had escaped her stinging eyes, but now she felt their wetness streaking down her cheeks. Embarrassed that she’d given in to weakness in front of this near stranger, Daisy reached for the handkerchief she kept in one of the deep pockets in her skirt and dabbed at her face.
Darting a glance at Thorn, she saw the awkward expression he wore. Men hated women’s tears—her husband had told her so often enough. He’d sneered when he’d told her that women cried for no reason other than to manipulate their menfolk. How could she have been so careless to have let Thorn—Mr. Dawson, Daisy reminded herself—see her cry? Would he think she was trying to manipulate him? No, surely not. It wasn’t as if Thorn was hers, and therefore someone she could persuade to do as she pleased, even if she’d wanted to. And she didn’t, of course. Besides, what could she even ask of him? All she wanted was for him to recover his health and go on his way, without ruining her reputation in the process.
“Why’s my mother crying? Did you make her cry?” an angry young voice demanded.
Neither of them had heard Billy Joe come into the barn. Her face flooding with guilty heat, Daisy flinched away from Thorn as if her son had caught them in an embrace, although naturally nothing could have been further from the truth.
“He—he didn’t make me cry,” Daisy said, her heart pounding at the fury she saw in her son’s eyes. While she was grateful that her son was protective of her, the last thing she wanted was for him to get in the habit of responding to every problem with anger, the way his father had. She spoke quickly and tried to keep her voice steady. “We were just... I was telling him about your father...”
“Oh.” Billy Joe’s shoulders sagged and the hot suspicion in his eyes cooled and was replaced by shame—the shame of a child who had never managed to please a demanding, always-angry parent. Daisy saw her son shoot a glance full of apology at Thorn.
She felt a rush of pity that a boy should have to understand that his father hadn’t been worthy of the role, and that his death had been a mercy to Billy Joe and herself, rather than a tragedy.
I’m sorry, son, I should have chosen better.
“I wish you didn’t have to go back to the restaurant this evening, Ma.” Billy Joe’s face was wistful now. “She works too hard, since Pa ain’t here no more,” he said, as if Thorn needed that explanation.
She saw the man nod with understanding. “I’m sorry, too, son,” she murmured. “But if I don’t work evenings, Mr. Prendergast will never let me off for church on Sunday mornings. As it is I’m only off duty at the restaurant every other Sunday morning,” she added to Thorn. “Tilly, the waitress, gets to be the cook then, and Mr. Prendergast’s sister takes over as waitress.”
“I dunno why we have go to church, anyway,” Billy Joe groused. “Gettin’ dressed up just to have to sit still for an hour...”
Daisy tamped down a rush of irritation. Though he had seemed, while they were courting, to be a faithful Christian, once they were married Billy Joe’s father had always complained about going to church, too, and in his last few years alive, he’d refused to go at all. “‘Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding,’—that’s what the Scriptures say. We go because we’re God-fearing people, not heathens,” Daisy said stiffly. “It’s my responsibility to see you get raised properly, which means attending worship service on Sundays. And remember, you agreed not to complain about it if I let Mr. Dawson recover here,” she said, with a meaningful glance at Thorn. “Besides,” she added, forcing a smile, “don’t you remember Reverend Gil saying he always likes hearing you singing the hymns? Maybe you’ll sing in the choir when you get older.”
Billy Joe snorted as if to demonstrate the likelihood of that.
Daisy cast a guilty look at the light coming into the barn and jumped to her feet.
“Land sakes, how long have we been chattering?” She’d have to go in and check the clock—one of the few household items she’d managed to avoid selling. “I have to get back to the restaurant! I’d planned to get the potatoes peeled so Billy Joe could start cooking them for dinner, to go with the ham that’s left.”
“I apologize for keeping you from your chores, ma’am,” Thorn said politely, rising in turn, with much less ease. “I reckon Billy Joe can peel some potatoes, can’t you?” he said, looking to Billy Joe for confirmation.
“’Course I can,” the boy muttered.
“All right then, thanks. I’d better scurry,” Daisy said. She wasn’t entirely sorry that she had to leave, though, to be honest with herself. The truth was, she’d enjoyed time spent speaking with another adult, an adult male at that, in a way that went beyond the brief hellos that were all she could manage when her friends came to eat at the hotel. She couldn’t remember when the time had flown so fast. But she shouldn’t get used to it, she reminded herself, because he wouldn’t be staying.
“Billy Joe, you be careful with that knife, mind. I need you to start those potatoes, and bring in some kindling. Set the table, too. Right now, or you’ll forget.” Plus, it would get her chatterbox of a son out of the barn. She’d seen the weariness on Thorn’s face and sensed he needed to rest.
“Aww, Ma, do I have to?” Billy Joe cried, dragging his foot through a pile of straw. “I was gonna talk to Mr. Thorn and keep him company,”
“Billy Joe, a man does what a lady asks of him, especially when that lady is his ma,” Thorn said, with a nod of encouragement at the boy. “I was feeling a need for a little nap, anyway.”
Was it her imagination, or was Thorn looking a little flushed? “You can come talk to Mr. Dawson after supper—if you wash the dishes,” Daisy told him. “They’d better be done when I come home.”
“Yes, Ma.”
Satisfied, Daisy shifted her gaze to Thorn. “Billy Joe will bring out your supper. I’ll bid you good-night now, since it will be late by the time I’m back. Come on, son.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
* * *
Thorn watched Daisy and the boy go, appreciating the gentle, graceful sway of her skirt as she walked. And because of how much he appreciated that, and how he immediately missed her company as soon as the barn door closed behind her, Thorn knew he needed to get himself gone from here as soon as possible. There was no use becoming too attached to what he couldn’t have. Ace was growing restless, too, not being used to spending so much time in a stall. Unfortunately, even though the horse wasn’t getting his usual exercise, he was still eating just as much as ever. Thorn couldn’t help but feel guilty about the bales of hay and the large bucket of oats that had appeared in the barn shortly after his arrival. He guessed Daisy could ill afford to feed his horse, if she worried about the cost of replacing chicken feed.
Thorn had considered letting the horse out to run off some of that energy. But allowing Ace to exercise in the small pasture behind the barn might have aroused too much curiosity from Daisy’s neighbors, since she apparently hadn’t had a horse for some time. And if one of the outlaws spotted Thorn’s distinctive bay, it would be as good as posting a sign to tell the Griggs gang where he could be found.
If he was going to leave, though, he’d have to regain his strength, which couldn’t be done by lying around in a barn all day. He’d have to find some tasks to help make himself active and strong again. For one thing, he’d promised Daisy he’d fix the barn roof before he departed, despite the fact that she’d said it wasn’t necessary. He’d have to ponder a way to manage that without being seen.
Right now, though, he was going to sleep. It seemed so hot in the barn all of a sudden. He wished he’d asked the boy to fetch him some cold water before he left him alone...
Some time later, Thorn roused from his sleep wishing he had a blanket. It was so cold his teeth were chat
tering. Had a norther blown in while he was napping?
He must have dozed again, for the lantern Billy Joe had brought was an island of light in the dark barn. The chill had faded completely and Thorn felt scorched with heat again. The boy was shaking him awake. “Thorn! Mr. Dawson! Wake up! Why are you so hot?”
“Billy Joe, is Mr. Dawson all right? Does he want some supper?” he heard Daisy call.
“Ma, he’s hot as a firecracker! I cain’t hardly wake him!” Billy Joe’s voice held an edge of panic.
Knowing Daisy was home brought Thorn partially out of his stupor. He heard her steps quicken, and then she was there, her cool hand to his forehead, her eyes wide with worry. He leaned into her touch, enjoying the coolness.
“Oh, dear, Billy Joe, he’s burning up with fever! How long has he been like this? Why didn’t you come get me at the restaurant?” she cried.
Thorn raised heavy eyes that wanted to remain shut to the boy hovering nearby and saw him flinch at the worried scolding in her tone.
“I didn’t know, Ma,” Billy Joe told her. “He was sleeping when I came out to check on him a while ago, but I didn’t think nothing about it—you said he’d be sleeping a lot. I didn’t think to check for fever... Is he sick, Ma? Is he gonna...” Billy Joe’s voice trailed off, but Thorn could fill in what he hadn’t said.
“Billy Joe, run and get the doctor, and tell him Mr. Dawson has taken a turn for the worse. Tell him I think his wounds got infected. Hurry now—don’t stop for anything!”
“I’ll be all right...” Thorn protested, as the boy’s running footsteps died away down the street. He staggered to his feet as if to prove what he said. He barely managed to stay upright. “Just have to rest...sweat this out...” He was not altogether sure his idea of a remedy would work, but he didn’t want to worry her. The stall was spinning around him and he closed his eyes against the too-bright, flickering light of the lantern. “But have to lie down now...”
He might have collapsed if she hadn’t assisted him back onto the cot.
“I’m going to the kitchen to make you some willow-bark tea to get that fever down,” she said, and her voice rang loudly in his ears, even though he could tell she had only murmured the words.
The ice was creeping through his veins again. “Bring me a blanket...please...when you come back...”
Chapter Five
“Must be s-some mistake here, Miss Lucybelle. I ordered...wh-whiskey... didn’t I?” Thorn mumbled, when Daisy returned and held the cup of warm liquid to his lips. The teeth of his upper jaw rattled against the crockery mug as a chill shook him, and the eyes that stared at her were wide, unfocused and overbright.
He’s delirious, she realized. Oh, when will Dr. Walker get here? What if the fever goes so high that he has a convulsion? What will I do then? Oh, Lord, help me!
“Drink this,” she ordered, in a firm but kind voice. “You’re sick, Thorn, and we need to get your fever down. And I’m Daisy, not Lucybelle. Do you know where you are?”
He looked around him with reddened, bleary eyes and wiped his sweaty forehead on his shirtsleeve. “No,” he admitted. “But wh-wherever it is, it’s mighty hot—then sometimes cold as a blue norther. H-how’s it changing like that? You—you’re not Lucybelle? No, I... Now that I’m lookin’, I—I guess I see that you ain’t. You got...light...h-hair like her, but hers is more y-yaller—yellow than yours is, I reckon,” he corrected himself, as if he realized how slurred his speech was.
“No, I’m Daisy Henderson, and you’re in my barn here in Simpson Creek, Texas. You’re recovering from gunshot wounds, and you got feverish—that’s why you thought I was someone else.”
“Daisy...” he said, reaching out a shaking hand and cupping her cheek. “You’re p-purtier than Lucybelle...but not’s purty as Selena. Don’t you t-try to t-tempt me. Cain’t s-stay here. Got to get back...to S-Selena.”
Lucybelle had sounded like a saloon girl, since he was expecting her to bring whiskey. But who was Selena? Another saloon girl, perhaps? It seemed there were several women in Thorn’s life, Daisy thought.
“I’m not trying to tempt you, Thorn,” she said agreeably. “I’m trying to get you well, so you can go back to Selena...or Lucybelle, as you wish. So drink the tea, so we can get that fever down. Then, once you’re recovered, you can figure out where you want to go.”
That was apparently enough motivation, for Thorn took hold of the cup and swallowed the rest of the liquid. The face he made afterward would have been comical if the situation wasn’t so dire.
“Whew! B-bitter st-stuff...” he muttered. “R-rotgut. Haven’t you got any g-good whiskey, Lucybelle?”
“Afraid not,” Daisy said, realizing that it was useless to insist this was medicine, or to try to convince him to call her by the correct name right now. Even though he seemed to be able to hear her, the meaning behind her words wasn’t really getting through the haze of the fever. “But you drank it, and that’s good. You don’t have to pay for it since you didn’t like it, Thorn,” she added, when he reached into the pocket of his trousers as if fishing for coins.
“Okay...thass—that’s—mighty kind ’a you...” He frowned, clearly thinking. “It won’t get you in trouble though, will it?”
“No, of course not. Don’t worry about that.”
“Lemme have th’ blanket, Lucybelle...cold in here. Musta had a n-norther blow in...”
Daisy spread the blanket around his shivering shoulders, then dipped the cloth she’d brought into the bucket of cool water and began to sponge his forehead. But he was apparently too much in the throes of his chill, for he pushed the damp cloth away.
“No-o-o, t-too cold... Why are ya tryin’ t’ freeze me, w-woman?”
“Thorn, we have to get the fever down—”
But it was no use trying to reason with a man who was out of his head with delirium. When he continued to struggle against her, she sank back on her heels, afraid he would strike out at her in his confusion.
Then she heard the pounding of footsteps outside, and a moment later Dr. Walker burst into the stall, panting, with Billy Joe close at his heels. Thank You, God.
Both the doctor and the boy were as red-faced as Thorn. Bless their hearts, they had apparently run all the way from the other end of town.
Dr. Walker let his bag drop into the hay with a thud and worked to catch his breath as Daisy told him how they’d found Thorn feverish, then freezing. How he’d begun talking out of his head, and that she’d given him some willow-bark tea.
“Good, good,” Nolan Walker muttered in approval. He pulled Thorn’s shirt up and lifted the edge of the bandage to peer at his shoulder wound, then checked the graze on his leg. Daisy told Billy Joe to go to bed, and for once, thankfully, he did so without argument.
“His leg seems fine, but the wound in the shoulder is infected, right enough. I’d worried about that one—it’s a bad wound, and he went quite a few hours before treatment. Still, I see no sign of gangrene,” Dr. Walker said, after the barn door closed behind the boy. “So he’s got a chance...”
“A chance?” Daisy repeated, full of fear at the grim look in the doctor’s eyes.
He nodded. “It could go either way. He’s going to need a lot of nursing and prayer, but with both of those, there’s a chance that he could survive.”
She thought then that the doctor would insist on moving Thorn out of the barn and down to his house, where he had a two-bed infirmary, but he didn’t. “First, we’ve got to get that fever down,” the doctor said.
He administered laudanum to sedate Thorn, who was still thrashing on the cot, and at last the wounded man lay quietly, not struggling against the cool wet cloths they wiped him down with. They worked on his body section by section, keeping the rest of him covered to battle against the chill that had him shivering from head to toe. They tended him fo
r hours, fighting against the fever, coaxing him into choking down more tea, and quietly praying together.
At last Dr. Walker, after feeling his forehead with a practiced hand, announced that the fever had broken.
“So he’ll live?” Daisy asked. “Thank You, God—”
Walker held up a palm as if to stop her flood of gratitude. “I’m sorry, but he’s not out of the woods yet, Miss Daisy. The fever’s down for now, but it’ll go back up again. Perhaps I’d better move him down to my office. It’s going to take a lot of vigilance—”
“No, please, leave him here,” she begged, though she wasn’t sure why she said it. How was she going to keep nursing him and do her job? If he was moved to the infirmary, he’d be able to get better and more constant care. Plus he’d be out of her hands, no longer able to cause her disgrace. She told herself she was objecting because if they moved him now, the commotion might cause her nosy neighbor, Mrs. Donahue, to peek out of her window and realize that Daisy had been harboring a man in her barn. And since the doctor was there, too, and Mrs. Donahue might have seen the sheriff going into the barn earlier, it wouldn’t take the woman long to put two and two together and realize it was one of the bank robbers.
Daisy admitted to herself there was another reason she had to be the one to nurse Thorn Dawson back to health—because of Peter. She hadn’t been able to save her brother, so she had to succeed with Thorn, despite all the limitations on her time that she hadn’t had then.
“I want to keep him here. We’ll do whatever has to be done,” she told the doctor.
There must have been something about the uncompromising firmness of her tone that said she would not budge on this point, for he finally nodded his acquiescence. Or did the doctor choose not to argue because he thought it didn’t matter much if an outlaw who claimed he wasn’t an outlaw died of his wounds? She didn’t dare ask.
“Very well,” Dr. Walker said, “though I can’t think you realize what you’re getting into. I want you to know you can change your mind at any time, Miss Daisy. Here’s what you’re going to need to do...”
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