She Shall Be Praised

by Ginny Aiken

  He knelt awkwardly at their side, and saw what she’d tried to express. His son lay on the ground unconscious, wounded in ways he couldn’t know right then. One thing, however, he did know. The boy had struck his head in the fall. If Robby didn’t come to, there was no telling what the outcome would be.

  Peter couldn’t bear the thought of another loss.

  Not Robby!

  “Let’s go,” he urged Wade. “Get the wagon ready. I need to get Robby to Doc Chalmers in Bountiful. I’ll bring Emma and you get Ned. He should come, too. The marshal will know what to do with them. You and Colley will have to manage things here yourselves until I can come home again. Robby comes first.”

  “But, boss. There’s too much to do here—”

  “I know.” His stomach roiled. But there really was nothing to think about. Between the ranch and his boy, his choice would always come down on Robby’s side. “I know better than anyone what all needs doing here, but it can’t be helped. Robby needs the doc, and I won’t let him wait for one of us to fetch him here. And it’s past time Emma went back. She’s said it often enough.” And he now knew she’d been right. He had to put himself as far away as possible from temptation. “This is the time to do it.”

  Emma gasped, covered her mouth with her hand. Then, without a word, she stood slowly. “I’ll go fetch my cloak and some blankets for Robby.”

  To Peter’s surprise, the woman who’d begged time and time again to be taken back to Bountiful didn’t appear glad to be getting her wish. Instead, she looked stricken. Surely her intense but odd response was on account of the boy’s injuries, right?

  She couldn’t possibly have any interest in staying.

  He glanced up briefly from his son and watched for a few seconds as she ran off. She cast glance after glance behind her. It would have taken a great deal of persuasion to convince him she’d only looked at his son, since a time or two those green, green eyes seemed to look straight at him.

  He didn’t know what her actions might mean, but he had Robby to think of right now.

  This wasn’t the time to ponder the possibilities.

  Emma’s heart ached to where she feared it might shatter into a million tiny pieces. As she gazed at that small, still body, as she watched the blood flow from the deep, open gash on Robby’s high forehead, grief and guilt mingled inside her. She never should have allowed herself to roll on the ground with—much less kiss—the child’s father. She’d been assigned Robby’s care. Yet she’d failed…

  … failed at the most critical task she’d ever attempted.

  Unwilling to waste another second, she ran into the cabin, gathered up her cloak, just about her only belonging, together with a quilt and a pair of pillows for Robby, and then hurried outside again, as ready for their trip as she would ever be. A final glance back ripped a sob out from deep inside her.

  Craziness, pure craziness! She would miss the rustic home… its residents even more.

  Tears scalded her eyes. She wanted nothing more than to get help for the innocent victim of her irresponsible, wanton behavior. And she had been wanton. She couldn’t deny she’d liked being kissed by Peter. A secret, newly discovered part of her wanted him to kiss her again.

  But reality couldn’t be changed. She should have been watching Robby.

  The heat of shame flooded her cheeks. While she had grown fond enough of the camp, and especially of its residents, she couldn’t bear even the thought of facing Peter again. She couldn’t stand the thought of meeting Colley’s almost uncanny, perceptive stare. And she couldn’t imagine facing Robby, the child she’d let down with her careless—and if one was to believe Peter—rebellious refusal to listen to what he called reason.

  But this wasn’t the time for recriminations. There’d be plenty of opportunity for those later on. This was the time to get Robby to the doctor, the time to care for the child she’d come to love. Time to do what she should have been doing in the first place.

  As she ran to the barn, arms overflowing, she realized Wade had wasted no time either. By the time she arrived, Peter’s horse had already been hitched to the serviceable buttercream-painted wagon. As the rancher picked up his seemingly broken child, she caught sight of tears on the strong man’s cheeks.

  Inside her chest, her heart felt squeezed, and she would have given much to run to his side and comfort him, encourage him. But she didn’t have that right. She was nothing to him, nothing but the woman who’d failed his son.

  She had to do her best to help him… them.

  At the wagon, she rose on tiptoe and dropped the cloak and bedding onto the wagon floorboards. Before Wade could offer help, she scrambled up inside, sat on the hard wooden bottom, and held out her arms for the boy. “Here,” she told Peter. “I’ll hold him still while you get us down to Bountiful.”

  Every inch of Peter Lowery broadcast his reluctance to relinquish hold of his son, but there wasn’t much else he could do. He couldn’t guide the horse while he held his child.

  Misery deep within her, she tried again. “Please…”

  She saw the anguish on Peter’s face as he placed Robby on her lap, in the tender way he eased a dark curl off the boy’s brow, in the way he winced when that touch came close to the open wound.

  Emma pulled her wits together. “It can’t be good for that to stay like that. We need something for the bleeding—”

  “Here!” Colley yelled, running toward them. “Wade said the boy was bleedin’ somethin’ fierce. You hafta put this clean flour sack bandage on the gash then press down on it. And you press hard, missy. You hafta keep it from bleeding any more’n it has to.”

  She recoiled. “But pressing hard will hurt him. Look how deep that is.”

  Colley punched her fists onto her sturdy hips and glared up at Emma. “If you don’t do what I tellya, poor kid’s gonna bleed out. That’ll really hurt ’im, don’tcha think? Ain’t gonna be doing much recovering without blood, is he?” She paused. “Ah… but you’re scared, ain’t ya?”

  Emma nodded, the tears pouring down her cheeks again.

  Colley clamped her lips tight and shook her head. “Don’t you be scared, Miss Emma. You hafta be strong for ’im, for ’em both. Peter here wants to be with his boy, but he has to handle the horse. And him with that broken leg and all. You hafta do the right thing. Push hard on that bandage. It’s nice and clean, and the boy needs ya to help ’im until ya get to Doc Chalmers’s. Ya hear?”

  Something about the insistence in the older woman’s rough voice pierced right through Emma’s fear. She found herself drawing strength from Colley’s urgency. And she remembered… she remembered the night Colley had revealed all those details of her life. The memories made Emma feel once again weak and silly and useless in comparison to the remarkable woman, and she knew she never wanted to feel that way again. She wanted to feel strong and capable and an asset to—to anyone.

  For that to happen, Emma had to draw on her own strength and courage, especially at that moment. Not for her sake, but rather for Robby’s sake. And Peter’s. She swallowed hard and did as she was told.

  Ned ran up to the wagon. “Miss Emma! Miss Emma! Y’almost fergot yer doggie. I brung her for ya. Here she is.”

  He dropped Pippa inside the wagon, and the little white pup trotted up to Robby’s side, stared at his face for a moment or two, licked his dirt-streaked cheek, and then curled up at the boy’s feet. The two of them had become great friends in the short time Emma and Pippa had spent at the camp. If—no! When Robby came to, he’d be glad to have Pippa at his side.

  But then, when Emma and her pet were on their way home to Portland again, why, the boy would surely miss the animal’s companionship. Still, she couldn’t let herself think that way. She had to think only of helping Robby recover from his wound.

  The trip down the mountain meant almost constant bouncing and jouncing over the rough, rutted trails. The hard bottom of the wagon offered her no comfort, especially since she held Robby across her lap. While she
had brought the quilt and two pillows with them, she’d used the much-folded blanket to provide the softest bed possible for the injured child. The pillows cushioned him on either side.

  As frightened as she was, she did what Colley had told her to do. She kept a firm pressure on the flour sack bandage, and while she fought back the mental image of the wound, her thoughts kept returning to the frightening sight. Her curiosity bit at her, so much that by the time they’d traveled for an hour or so, she could no longer resist. She lifted a corner to check on the gash.

  Scant seconds after she eased up on the pressure, the blood beaded up on the raw edges of the flesh. Immediately, the deep cut bled again. Colley had been right. Emma had to keep that pressure constant, all the way to town.

  Up front, sitting high on the simple bench, Ned and Peter rode in absolute silence, neither man breaking the agonizing hush. Emma didn’t remember the trip from Bountiful to where she’d taken Pippa for her constitutional having taken this long. She must have dozed off for longer than she remembered.

  Even though the silence grew more awkward by the minute, she preferred the discomfiture to any conversation with Peter. She couldn’t make herself meet his gaze. The memory of their kiss lived too vivid in her thoughts, and made the embarrassment too great for words. Perhaps it was best for her to return to Bountiful.

  “Oh, goodness!” she said under her breath. Perhaps?

  No, no. Of course it was best to return to town, to return to her normal life. Indeed. Papa needed to know she was fine. She couldn’t stay away even a moment longer than necessary.

  But if that was the case, then why did she feel sudden emptiness at just the thought of leaving? After all, she’d wanted desperately to leave no sooner than she’d arrived.

  Emma didn’t belong at the camp. She didn’t. That wasn’t the life for her. Her life was back in Denver, in Portland, at Papa’s side, or… oh!

  Mr. Hamilton. Joshua Hamilton.

  Her… fiancé.

  First she went hot. Then she went cold.

  She… she’d actually forgotten the poor man! How could she have? And after he’d given her the dog she loved so dearly, just so she wouldn’t forget him. What kind of woman did that make her? That she had scarcely thought of the man she intended to wed in those first days after the holdup, and then… nothing. She hadn’t spared him a single, solitary second after that.

  Was she such a fickle-hearted fool? First, she’d accepted a man’s proposal. Then, she’d wound up on this mountain where she’d thought only of herself and the hardships she’d encountered.

  She hadn’t thought of Joshua’s worry and grief.

  Oh, goodness gracious. Hardships?

  Hah! Hardly.

  All she’d encountered was a way of life different from the one she’d known before. Hardship was what Colley had experienced, what Peter had gone through to carve out a life in a new land, to build a ranch, to create a heritage for his son, even after he’d lost the woman he loved.

  And here she’d thought it a hardship to be rescued by a decent, God-fearing man, who’d taken her to his home, where his equally decent ranch manager had shown her how much a woman could do. She’d also learned how easy it was to love a child, one you hadn’t birthed yourself. In the meantime, she’d learned a number of skills she’d come to appreciate.

  She was no longer the Emma who’d left Aunt Sophia’s house in Denver all of… how many weeks ago had it been?

  Emma shook her head at her own silliness. It didn’t matter. She’d lost track of time while she became a brand-new woman; she’d stopped counting days. At the current moment, however, what really mattered was the child on her lap… and the man who’d made her look at herself and see her own flaws, her lack.

  A pang of sadness struck her heart, and she bit her bottom lip. How could she not have known how frivolous she’d been? How foolish of her.

  She had a lot of hours left until they reached Bountiful, a lot of hours to think about the girl she had been, the woman she’d become, and the one she would continue to grow into.

  And that long ride gave her a whole lot of time to pray. She’d never keep growing if she turned away from the God she was coming to know.

  “Oh Lord… don’t leave me now…”

  “What have we here?” the white-haired woman said as she opened the door. When she saw Robby in Peter’s arms, she gasped. “Oh, no! Doc! Come down here right now. Hurry, you hear?”

  Emma twisted her fingers, her anxiety growing worse by the minute. The lady’s reaction was alarming. What if…?

  No! She couldn’t let herself contemplate such a thing.

  “What in tarnation, woman?” a rotund gentleman with only a ruff of graying brown hair around the lower hemisphere of his head appeared on the stairs. “I told you I needed some sleep earlier, what with that McGarvey baby taking so everlasting long to birth last night, and today—”

  “I’m sorry to come here at such a late hour, Doc,” Peter said. “My boy’s had an accident. We need you.”

  The doctor’s eyes opened wide. “Never you mind a word I just babbled there, son. And the hour makes no never mind. Come on into my office straight away.”

  Emma knew she didn’t have the right to follow, but no power on earth would have kept her from Robby right then.

  “Put him over there.” The doctor indicated the leather-covered examination table. “From what I can see, he’ll be needing stitches. And some more than that, too, I reckon, but let’s see to stopping the bleeding first.”

  Peter lowered the boy onto the brown leather. Worry carved lines on his brow.

  “It’s quite deep,” Emma murmured, fearful for the boy. “And it has bled a great deal.” She stepped closer to the physician. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  The doctor looked her over. “Thank you, kindly, miss. I do appreciate your offer.” He crossed the room to the washstand and scrubbed his hands. As he dried them, he cast a glance over his shoulder. “My wife usually helps, seeing as she’s trained in nursing the ill. But, go on now, and tell me this. Who do I have the pleasure of talking to? As pretty as you are, I’d remember if I’d seen you before. I don’t reckon I’ve had the pleasure of making your acquaintance.”

  “I’m Miss Emma Crowell,” she said. “From London, Denver, and Portland.”

  The doctor’s salt-and-pepper eyebrows rose as he crossed to the examination table and lifted the flour sack bandage from Robby’s forehead. “You don’t say? And you’re in these parts because…?”

  Emma took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. “Well, sir, a number of weeks ago I was on my way home to Portland after a visit to my auntie and uncle in Denver, when I was the victim of a holdup. A band of outlaws stopped our carriage—”

  “Well, I’ll be a ten-toed rooster…” The doctor dropped Robby’s bandage back in place after a close scrutiny of the swollen, split flesh. “Everyone here in town’s heard all about you by now, I reckon. The reverend and his wife were beside themselves, distraught about your fate out there in the wilds and at the mercy of thievin’ outlaws. That poor driver, we couldn’t stop him from punishing himself over your loss. I mean, we all of us here in town thought you were a goner, what with outlaws not being known for taking kindly to meager pickings when they strike.”

  As he talked, he picked up the gas lantern on his desk and brought it close to Robby. He lifted each of the child’s eyelids. When done with his examination, he set the light back in place, and then walked to a glass-fronted white-metal cabinet in the corner. He reached inside, evidently for supplies.

  He kept up his end of the conversation. “So… Miss Emma—Crowley, you say?”

  “Crowell, sir. Emma Crowell.”

  “Miss Emma Crowell it is, then.” He crossed the room, his steps crisp against the highly polished wood floor. “Tell me all about your adventure, missy, while I sew up this boy.”

  Peter cleared his throat and shifted from foot to foot. “Is that all you’re going to do
for him? Sew him up and talk to Emma?”

  The doctor stopped, his last step echoing in the heavy silence. “There’s not a whole lot a body can do for him until he comes to but to keep him right comfortable, clean up his wound, and suture it up, son. And pray.” He pinned Peter with a serious stare. “Pray a whole lot. Your boy needs the Great Healer to show up soon and heal him right quick.”

  When he returned to the examination table, he held a small brown bottle in one hand and a couple of other items in the other, one of which was a shiny silver needle. Emma’s stomach lurched. The thought of that cold, sharp metal piercing Robby’s skin was too much for her.

  Before she could brood too long over what was about to happen, the physician spoke to her again. “Tell me about that there holdup, missy. And how it is you came to wind up here at my house with Peter tonight. I say none of it makes much sense to me.”

  As Emma recounted her experiences, she grew aware of a presence at her back. A glance over her shoulder revealed Ned, pale, lines of exhaustion on his lean and youthful face, concern in his muddy brown eyes. She gestured him closer.

  The doctor noticed. “Now who might this be?”

  Ned grimaced, spun his hat a full circle before his stomach with his big hands. “I’m one of them fools what held up Miss Emma’s carriage,” he said, shame in his droopy shoulders and morose face. “I’ve asked forgiveness, sir.” He shrugged, resignation dawning on his features. “I ain’t no fool. I reckon I’ll be havin’ me some time with the law, pretty soon now.”

  Doc Chalmers turned to Peter. “Well, son, seems to me you’ve had your bonnet right full for a spell now, haven’t you?”

  “Bonnet?” Peter tipped his mouth up into a twisted half-smile. “I reckon I would agree, Doc.”

  “Seein’ as there ain’t much you can do here, Pete, hovering over your son, and all, why’n’t you head on over to the boarding house and fetch Adam Blair? He can handle your male guest here better’n I can.”

  Peter looked at his son, immobile on the examination table. “But Robby—”