by Mimi Milan
“Good morning.” Emily Potts studied them, her eyes ultimately falling on Ukchuu. “Is there something I can help you with?”
A rare smile formed and Kela suspected this was the real reason the dream hunter insisted on joining their party. The notion grew when Ukchuu failed to respond, instead standing there like a possum pretending to be dead—completely stock-still. She would have given him a swift whack with the back of her bow. However, she had already been advised to make a better impression than when they had all seen each other in the store. Thus far, Ukchuu seemed to be doing that far better than her—and with no words at all.
“We are here to see the doctor,” she finally spoke up. “We are to share our ways and learn his.”
Emily looked surprised. “The doctor made no mention of this to me.”
Just like a man to go about his business and never inform the woman. Kela slightly grimaced, but otherwise remained as motionless as her companions.
Seeing the Miwok had no intention of leaving, Emily excused herself. “It’s mighty early for a visit. I’ll see if the doctor is about the day yet.” She motioned them in. “Y’all wait right here.”
The woman disappeared down the hall.
“Strange place,” Tuweeyu said as he approached a cupboard full of porcelain figurines. “What magic makes these people stay in place?”
Kela joined him to study the small people, fingering one in the image of a child. She picked it up to test the weight in her hand. “They are like dolls, but hard.”
She returned it to its place on the shelf and wandered into the adjoining room—the one that served as the clinic. She scrutinized its sparse furnishings, deciding that they were practical. A row of metal instruments sat in a row on a table. She noted the tiny tools like the peculiar toys they were and quickly lost interest to cross back through to where she had started and into the opposite room.
This is not the room of a medicine man, but of a great chief.
Kela noted the beautifully detailed room with decorated trim and oversized furniture. However, the comfortable furnishings didn’t hold her attention nearly as much as the large portrait above the stone hearth did. Staring down at her was a red-haired woman, her alabaster skin not much darker than the figurines she had spied only minutes earlier. Even though inanimate, Kela had a keen sense that the woman was weighing her. Was she worthy? Of what, Kela was unsure. She couldn’t shake the sense that her mission would entail more than medicine, though.
“That’s Ms. Regina,” Emily said as she approached the spot where Kela stood, “the doctor’s wife.”
“He is married?” Kela asked and then chided herself for posing such a question. It should not have mattered if this man had a wife or not. Of course, should and did were two terribly different things—a fact which bothered her immensely.
“Well, I suppose you would say that he is a widower.”
“I do not know this word ‘widower.’”
“Oh, I see.” Emily searched for the best explanation. “Well, it’s not really polite conversation. I suppose there’s no harm in explaining, though. Mr. Edwards was married to Ms. Regina. However, she’s dead now. So, that makes him a widower.”
“I am sorry to hear of his loss. Although, this will be good for you.”
“Good for me? I don’t understand.”
“You sleep here, yes?”
“Uh, yes. I do.”
“Then that makes you the new Mrs. Edwards.”
A small gasp escaped Emily’s mouth before she could cover it or her humorous smile with the back of her hand.
“Honey, where in the world did you get that idea? There are laws against that sort of thing, you know. Even out here where there’s a lot more freedom than back east, people of the race can’t be marrying whoever they please all willy nilly like. Besides, I don’t and would never feel that way about Doctor Edwards. He’s nothing more than an employer. A good one, mind you, but nothing more.”
It confused and irritated Kela to know she was relieved to hear that the doctor and Ms. Potts were not together. So, she focused her thoughts elsewhere.
“I remember now. There has been talk amongst my people. The Miwok do not have such laws. They seem foolish. If a man or woman can contribute to the people, it is a benefit to all.”
“Too bad there aren’t more of you around,” Emily mumbled.
Kela frowned. “There were. They were taken from us.”
Emily reached out and Kela didn’t mind so much when she placed a hand on her shoulder. “I understand. Believe me, honey. I really do.”
An unexpected kinship was born between the women at that moment—an understanding of how they could be different and yet so much the same.
“I’m not interrupting. Am I?”
Both women turned.
“Not at all, Doctor Edwards.” Smiling, Emily returned her attention to Kela. “I hope we’ll have a chance to get to know one another better. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to attend to the children.”
Kela nodded her agreement and Emily walked off.
Doctor Edwards returned his attention to Kela once more. He motioned to the opposite room. “Would you care to see my clinic? It’s where I treat sick patients.”
“I have seen it.”
Jonathan hesitated. “You have?”
“Yes. I looked through it while you were away.”
“Um, yes, but I mean really see it? Would you like a demonstration of how the instruments function?”
“I have seen them as well.”
“Perhaps, but you haven’t seen how they work.”
“I have no use for children’s playthings.”
Jonathan balked. “Playthings? They are most certainly not for play, and I am far from a child.”
He stood up a little straighter, demanding she take notice of him.
She did.
“You have a strange face. One eye is different than the other.”
“Uh… Only slightly,” Jonathan said, his voice breathy. “I’m surprised you noticed.”
“How can I not? One is blue. The other has more green in it.”
“Yes, a birth defect I suppose.”
“This word ‘defect,’ what does it mean?”
“A flaw or imperfection—something undesirable; unwanted.”
“Not wanted? Why would you not want two spirits? Tuweeyu has two spirits. That is one of many gifts O-let'-te has given us.”
“Tuweeyu?” Jonathan asked, thoroughly puzzled. “O-let'-te?”
Kela cocked her head in one direction. “That is Tuweeyu, also known as Creeping Cougar. O-let'-te is the coyote man who existed among the first spirits before there were people. He created the first ancestors.”
“I believe in a single Creator as well,” Jonathan said. “I think we should leave it at. Although, I do find your story fascinating. Perhaps you can tell me another at a later time.”
Smiling, Kela nodded. “That can be done. However, I cannot be the only one teaching. I am here to learn as well.”
“I suppose I can give you a book to read until we have an actual patient.”
Kela scrunched up her nose. “I do not know how to form words on a paper.”
“You can’t read?” Jonathan waved away any possible answer. “But you speak so well.”
“There was never any need to look at the words, only to speak them.”
“I see we have much to learn then. We will start with the alphabet and simple words.”
Kela frowned. While she was indeed interested in learning how to read, and maybe even write the words she spoke, this was not what she had come to learn. “That is good, but I wish to make medicine. That is how I will help my people.”
“I understand.” Jonathan seemed to be contemplating the situation. “I’ll tell you what. How about we do both at the same time? There are some house calls I have to make. Perhaps you can come ride along with me in my wagon. That way I can teach you some of the letters. What say you?”
; She looked back at her companions to gauge their opinions.
“I have business in town,” Ukchuu said.
The urge to press him on what sort of business he had weighed on Kela, but she decided to let it be. Ukchuu was not her husband or even her brother, and while she did care about what happened to him, she could not sacrifice her task for him. So, she looked to Tuweeyu.
“I can accompany him or you. It is your choice.”
Kela looked the doctor over carefully before making her decision. She nodded in Ukchuu’s direction. “He will have more trouble than I.”
Her comment caused the doctor’s eyes to grow wide and she almost laughed at the unease she read there. Could it be? Was it possible that this man—one who came from those who murdered solely for a parcel of land that none but the earth could own—was frightened of her? She who could not even earn the respect of other women in her village?
Amused, she smiled. “Yes, Jonathan Edwards. I will go with you.”
Chapter 5
She was a quiet one. Not that he was complaining, of course. He was the same. However, they were supposed to be learning from one another and, while she may have told him a little bit about her people before the ride out to the Santiago home, the only sound since had been that of the wheels on the road—which for some inexplicable reason were starting to grate on his nerves.
He cleared his throat. “What do you think of the book? Is it easy enough to understand?” he asked of the early primer he had borrowed from one of his children.
“Yes.”
He glanced over to the pages she perused. “Oh, that’s a good one right there. It’s about a little boy who wants to go fishing.”
“I know.”
“You do?” he asked, surprised. “Have you learned to read it already?”
“No.”
“Oh. Well, um… Then how do you know?”
She turned the book around for him to see a crude drawing of a book with a rod at a river and a single fish swimming in it.
Jonathan frowned. “That would be the masterpiece of my son, Owen. He knows better than to write in the books. It is an old reader, though. Perhaps he did it a while back and I simply failed to notice.”
“Why did you not notice?”
He hesitated. What could he say? That he didn’t discern the happenings in his own home? That he was too busy hiding in a bottle, licking his wounds like some injured animal?
“Uh, I guess I’ve been busy.”
The silence settled between them again and they continued on like that until reaching their destination. He climbed down from the wagon and made his way to her side to help her out. However, she jumped down before he could offer his assistance, quietly landing in front of him. She stood erect, mere inches from him and he couldn’t help but notice the sprinkle of freckles that dotted her face.
“How strange,” he said in a barely audible tone. Yet, she heard him all the same. She frowned.
“What is strange?”
“Strange? Well, ‘strange’ means when something is—”
“No. What do you call strange?”
“Oh, um, your face.”
Her brows knitted together.
“No, no. I didn’t mean it like that. Your face isn’t strange at all. It’s a very nice face, in fact—a pretty one. I mean...” He sighed. What did he mean anyway? And why was he telling her she was pretty? Not that she wasn’t. She was. He shouldn’t be thinking she was, though. He inwardly groaned. What was wrong with him? “Never mind. I’ll explain it later. We’re here. So, we might as well make our presence known.”
“Yes.”
“You know,” he said as he reached past her into the wagon to grab his bag, “you don’t speak much.”
“You speak enough for two people.”
“I suppose you’re—Hey! Are you trying to say I talk a lot?”
She only shrugged.
“I’ll have you know that I’m usually quite silent,” he said. However, the declaration got him to thinking and he suddenly realized that it was something of a falsehood. He actually wasn’t a quiet person at all. It was only after Regina’s death that he became this way. How had that escaped his notice before now? They began their walk to the porch. “Perhaps I talk a little more than I thought. At least, I used to. In fact, I remember someone once telling me that, given enough time, I could probably talk the hind legs off a donkey.”
“They are wrong,” she said.
“How so?” he asked.
“It would have no legs at all.”
He threw his head back and roared. It was the kind of laugh that reached down into his belly to spew forth like a volcano, rumbling through his throat to set the air on fire with the warmth it created within him. “You probably cause a lot of trouble back home. Don’t you?”
“Sometimes.”
She smiled at him and he suddenly grew even warmer. However, he wasn’t so sure if he could accredit the laughter as the reason for that feeling. He nervously ran his free hand through his hair. “I guess it’s kind of rude to stand on someone’s land without announcing yourself. Let’s go make our introductions.”
She nodded her agreement and strode beside him up to the front door. He gave it a brisk knock and they waited.
And waited.
“That’s strange,” he said. Then he leaned forward and knocked again. “I know they traveled out towards San Francisco, but that was almost two weeks ago. They should have been back by now, though.”
“Perhaps they choose to stay longer.”
“No, that doesn’t sound like Miguel. His wife, Araceli, is with child. I remember when they came down to the clinic for a routine visit. He had inquired if it was safe for them to travel. I said there should be no problem as long as they were careful and returned soon. I specifically recall him saying they would be back in ‘two shakes of a lamb’s tail.’”
She smiled wide.
“Yes, I thought it amusing as well. That’s why I remembered it.” He looked at the door curiously. “That is why I don’t understand why no one’s answering.”
He knocked on the door once more. It still failed to produce any results.
“Wait here,” he said and descended the porch only to disappear around the side of the house. He returned only minutes later.
“Your face is not pretty,” she said. “It says there is trouble here.”
What a keen observation, he thought. “I believe you’re right. Their wagon is here and the horses put up. However, they seem aggravated and I can’t help but wonder if it might have to do with their buckets being empty. It looks like they haven’t eaten in a while.”
Kela frowned. “The horse is a noble creature. We must feed them at once.”
“We will,” he said. “But we must find out what happened to Miguel and Araceli first.”
His hand touched the handle and he hesitated. It felt so wrong to walk up into someone else’s home without permission, and he was suddenly thinking about Regina again. Is this how it had happened? Had she been inside with the children when an intruder forced his way into their home?
“What is wrong?” Kela asked. “Are we to not find your people?”
“Yes,” he said, thoroughly enjoying the way she had worded her question. These were two upstanding residents of the town—not to mention his patients. That made them his people. It was his duty to find out what had become of them.
He carefully turned the knob and the door popped open.
“Hello?” he asked. Then he walked in and immediately stopped. A pungent smell hit him hard enough to make him take a step back.
“There is sickness here,” Kela said. She stepped back as well until she was safely on the porch once again. “I cannot go in there.”
“Why not?” Jonathan asked.
“I will not risk bringing sickness to my people.”
Her answer was reasonable, but that did little to ease his mind. In fact, it rather irritated him. As a doctor, he believed his job was to hel
p those in need—regardless of who the individual might be. He crossed his arms. “If it were reverse with your people sick and you knew I was in a position to help, wouldn’t you welcome it?”
“Yes, but who is to say they welcome us?”
“I’ve never known anyone ill to not welcome assistance.”
“Perhaps. However, your people have already brought other illnesses to mine. I cannot risk bringing yet another. I am to bring knowledge—not death wrapped in a blanket.”
He wanted to call her unreasonable, but he could understand her position. From what he had learned, the numbers in their tribes declined every month... and part of it from stories of trading clothes and blankets with settlers only to find out later that they came from the dead, their families selling such belongings with the hopes of affording the funeral. He sighed with disappointed resignation. “Then could you assist in another way? Would you go and care for their animals and make sure they are fed? I’m sure you’ll find whatever you need in the barn around back.”
Kela nodded. “What you ask, I can do.”
She disappeared around the side of the house and Jonathan turned back. He looked into the empty home, light streaming into the living room. Perhaps Kela had a good point. The smell was definitely a sick one, reminiscent of his time back east when he volunteered in orphanages, shelters and even sanatoriums. It was the stench of vomit and sweat, and while he was certain that he could tolerate such symptoms himself, he did not want to bring those things back to the clinic for others to contract—or worse, pass them on to his children.
Jonathan crouched down beside his medical bag and dug around for the cotton clothes he used to bandage wounds and clean up after surgeries. He pulled one out and tied it around his face, covering his nose and mouth. Perhaps doing so would create something of a mask that would protect him from whatever illness waited within the house. At the very least, it would make the stink a little more tolerable.
“Hello?” Jonathan called as he entered the home. Light streamed into the receiving room, illuminating small particles of dust floating on the air as quiet as will-o'-the-wisps.
“Who is it?” A weak voice sounded from above.
