Cowboy Creek Christmas

by Cheryl St. John

  “I didn’t realize you have a patient.”

  “I get more as the ladies discover the joys of soft, moisturized skin this time of year. I can’t actually refer to them as patients, because dry winter skin isn’t an illness or injury, but they are paying clients.” She picked up where she’d left off with her history.

  He was fascinated by her matter-of-fact recitation of jobs and duties. Anyone else would have worked themselves to exhaustion or given up, but her dogged determination had driven her to succeed at everything she lifted her hands to do.

  “You’re an amazing woman, Marlys.”

  She seemed to lose her train of thought, standing in her work room, the sun slanting through the panes of glass to set fire to her hair. It had grown out since she’d been here, and she now tucked one side behind her ear before lifting her gaze to meet his eyes. “Not so amazing,” she said barely above a whisper.

  “Completely extraordinary,” he corrected. “You see yourself differently than I see you. I see someone who sacrificed and worked hard to achieve a dream. I see a woman whose dream is also sacrificial, wanting to heal others because she genuinely cares about all humanity.”

  “My father said I was selfish. He told me I was spoiled for putting my own dreams ahead of what he wanted for me.” She rested her fingertips on the counter. “He made me feel guilty for wanting to become a doctor.”

  “No one thinks twice about a man wanting to become a doctor,” Sam replied.

  “And in addition, I chose a different path than the commonly accepted studies and treatments.”

  “All the great people who came before us chose different paths. Blaise Pascal, Louis Braille, Isaac Newton.”

  She cast him a cynical glance. “Your opinion of me is highly inflated to list me in their company.”

  “Who’s to say? You’re young. You could still find a cure for consumption.”

  “I’m not a scientist.”

  “You work with medical science every day. Some inventions are quite by accident.”

  She didn’t argue with that, but she had managed to twist the topic.

  “My opinion that you’re amazing and extraordinary remains.”

  “You confuse me, Sam.”

  “I don’t mean to.”

  “I know you don’t. But everything was settled.” She gestured with a hand in the air. “My life was on a path. I knew exactly what I wanted.” Her hand fluttered back to the counter. “I’ve always set my expectations high, and I’ve refused to be disappointed. I came here to build a better future—for myself. For this land.”

  “And you are.”

  “And then I walked into your newspaper, and everything changed. I’m not certain of myself anymore, and I don’t like the feeling.”

  He set down his pad and pencil and took the few steps toward her, reaching out to bracket her shoulders. Her scent reached him, and yearning curled inside. “And I’m probably a fool for entertaining the idea that you might feel something in return. We’ve been down this road once, and it didn’t turn out well for me. But I can’t help what I feel.”

  Her breath touched his chin as she looked up at him. “What do you feel?”

  “I’ve always admired you, your determination, your intelligence, your fervor. You’re a visionary. I understand what you want, what you’re trying to do here. I even want to help you. Somewhere along the line I think you got the idea that you would have to give up your dreams to be loved. I’m not asking you to change. I think you’re perfect just the way you are. I just wish you’d let me in. Let me be part of that better future you want.”

  Her lips parted as though she wanted to say something, but no words came out.

  He took the moment to lean forward and touch his lips gently to hers.

  She grasped the front of his shirt and kissed him back.

  They clung together that way, and his pulse hammered mercilessly. She had to feel it. Her painful honesty was contagious and inspired him to tell her his feelings. Was it too soon to call it love? Maybe, but his heart certainly seemed to be headed that way.

  A bell rang, and she took a step back.

  The bell rang again. She blinked. “I have to tend to my patient.”

  Turning, he watched her hurry from the room and stood collecting his thoughts, gathering his composure.

  He took a seat and made a few notes. The two women’s voices came from the other room, and it didn’t sound as though they were speaking English. Abruptly the clanging bell over her door rang.

  “Doc! Doc Boyd!”

  * * *

  Marlys left her client to dress and rushed to see who’d called out.

  A man in a bulky fur coat hobbled across the waiting room. “Stepped on a nail, I did. Thing went clean through my foot and hurts like the very blazes.”

  She moved behind him and helped him shrug out of his heavy coat.

  “What can I do?” Sam appeared from her office, and she avoided eye contact.

  “Hey, Sam.”

  “Owen.”

  “Don’t know how I did such a fool thing,” he said with a grimace. “Nail went clean through the sole of my boot.”

  “How did you get here?” Sam asked.

  “Hobbled to the doorway and hollered till Irving heard me over at the furniture store,” the older man explained. “He borrowed someone’s horse from behind the hotel, and I rode. He’s taken the animal back now.”

  “Owen Ewing is the undertaker,” Sam explained to Marlys. “Cabinets, too, I understand.”

  “We met the day of thanksgiving celebration.” Marlys gestured. “Can you make it back to an examination room?”

  “Here, lean on me,” Sam offered.

  Owen took him up on the offer and the three of them moved to the back. She prepared an area with clean toweling and helped him get situated on the exam table so she could remove his boot. Blood still pooled from a wound on the top of his foot and another on the bottom.

  Sam cringed but asked, “Mind if I stay and watch? I’m doing a piece on the doctor.”

  “Stay if you like, as long as somebody puts out the fire in my foot.” The man bared his teeth in pain.

  “I am going to see my last patient out and put on more water to heat. Put your foot up on the table.” She left and returned minutes later to offer Owen a cup of tea. “Drink all of it.”

  He made another face after tasting it, but obeyed.

  “All right, now lie back, and we’ll keep this foot elevated to be certain the bleeding has stopped.”

  She propped the foot on rolled towels and stood applying pressure to both of the punctures.

  “I can’t afford to be laid up,” Owen said. “Because it’s winter I have a lot of jobs for interior building lined up. Houses are going up all along the street east of Lincoln Boulevard. The town council is deciding on names for a couple more streets.”

  “I don’t believe this will be a lengthy recovery,” Marlys assured him. “I once treated a man with a larger wound to his foot, and he was working two weeks later.”

  “Two weeks is a lot of money I’d be losing.”

  “If the healing time stretches out, maybe some of the rest of us can help you,” Sam offered. “I’m not much with a saw or hammer, but I can take directions and fetch for you.”

  “That’s real generous of you, Samuel.”

  “Yes, very generous, Mr. Mason.” She gave Sam an approving glance, and he almost puffed out his chest.

  “We’re going to soak your foot first,” Marlys told Owen. “To make sure it’s clean before I treat it.” She left and returned with an oblong pail of water that smelled of one of her mineral concoctions. “Let’s get your foot in here.”

  Owen gingerly let down his foot into the warm water and hissed.

  Th
e water turned red with his blood.

  “That’s mostly from the blood already covering your foot,” she told him. “The wounds have pretty much stopped bleeding. I added an anesthetic property to the water that should help when I treat it.”

  Owen nodded his understanding.

  “I’m going to scrub your foot in fresh water now,” she said. “The tea should help with pain, too. I won’t directly touch the wound just yet.”

  She did as she’d explained, using a soft brush and a grayish pungent mixture. She’d been right about the bleeding. It had all but stopped. When he removed his foot from the pail, she dried it gently and examined the puncture marks. “All right. It’s clean, and now I’m going to apply dressing and wrap it.”

  “What about stitches?”

  “I don’t think you need stitches. As long as you keep that foot up the rest of today, the wounds are going to close up nicely on their own.”

  She returned with a dish of bruised leaves. “The Gardners’ housekeeper is named Ewing, as well,” she mentioned. “Are you family?”

  “Valentine is my sister,” he said. “She was bored with only me to look after. Caring for the Gardners isn’t work to her. She took to Leah right off when the poor gal was laid up before the baby. Daniel is one of the finest men I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. And now with Little Evie—well, my sister is as happy as a hog in a sweet potato patch. She has a gentleman friend who calls and comes for dinner or takes her out. I suspect he’s asked her to marry him, but she’s not agreed for fear of leaving me alone.”

  “What are those leaves you’re applying?” Sam asked.

  “Peach leaves,” she answered. “Prevents lockjaw and promotes swift healing. I think Owen will be amazed how quickly the pain is relieved and new skin grows. Reportedly this remedy works on horses with hoof injuries, as well.”

  “Did you learn this from your Chinese studies or is this an Indian remedy?”

  “Neither,” she answered. “I learned it from one of the German-speaking families.”

  Sam shook his head. “You’re a force to be reckoned with, Dr. Boyd.”

  She looked to Owen. “Where’s your place, Mr. Ewing?”

  “Valentine and I share a house on Grant Street, just across from my shop to the west.”

  “Sam, do you have time to get a horse or a friend to escort Mr. Ewing home? I’d prefer he stay completely off that foot until tomorrow.”

  “Happy to oblige.”

  “Thank you. I’ll walk over to the Gardners’ house and let Valentine know what happened, and that you’ll be at home resting.”

  Sam got his coat and hat and headed out, the bell over the door clanging behind him. She mixed a powder with a small amount of water and handed the corked bottle to her patient. “Take this in a cup of tea to help you sleep tonight.”

  “Thanks, Doc. How much do I owe?”

  She gave Owen a price, and he paid her in coins. “That Mason fellow is nice. Puts out a fine newspaper. He’s smart, but not conceited smart, if you know what I mean.”

  “I do.”

  “You’re mighty smart yourself. Calm. Efficient. Not hard on the eyes.” He chuckled.

  She grinned. “Thank you for trusting me with your care.”

  While they waited, she cleaned up the mess, rinsed and bundled the towels. When Sam returned with a wagon, she got Owen’s coat and helped Sam assist him up to the seat. After tugging on her boots and shrugging into her coat, she walked through a light-falling snow to the Gardners’ home, where she gave Leah the message for Valentine.

  “I’m so glad you knew how to help him,” Leah told her.

  “So am I.”

  She walked back feeling as though she’d accomplished something positive with her day. It was a good feeling. Underneath the satisfaction, however, was the confusion of Sam’s kiss and her unsettling feelings for him. She’d never been afraid of change—or so she’d thought—but somehow this particular change frightened her. She prayed for wisdom and took comfort that God had granted Solomon much more than he’d asked for because he’d desired wisdom. Back in her rooms, she took her Bible from her bureau drawer and thumbed through the pages until she found what she searched for in the First Book of Kings. And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore. “Thank You, Lord, for wisdom and understanding and largeness of heart.”

  * * *

  On Saturday she was awakened to pounding on the rear door. Patients never arrived in the back; in fact no one had ever knocked on that door. She pulled on her dressing gown and slippers and stood at the door. “Who is it?”

  “It’s me, Dr. Boyd!” came a familiar childish voice from the other side. “It snowed all night!”

  She pushed open the door to find August and Sam had already scraped snow off her stoop. The space between her building and the back of the laundry was sparkling white with fresh new snow.

  “Get dressed,” Sam told her. “You promised August a morning of sledding.”

  August set a warm covered bowl in her hands. “It’s oatmeal.”

  “All right. Give me a few minutes. I have to dig in my trunk for leggings and warm clothing. Go around to the front, and I’ll let you in so you can wait inside.” She hurried to unlock the front door and scurried back to prepare, pausing for bites of the tasty maple-sweetened oatmeal.

  “Which one of you knows how to cook such delicious oatmeal?”

  “Neither,” Sam replied. “We smelled Aunt Mae’s cooking next door when we woke up and invited ourselves over to eat with the boarders. She never minds. I asked for something easy to bring to you, and she scooped oatmeal into a bowl.”

  She joined them, dressed in her warmest garments and a red knitted cap and sat to pull on her boots. Sam helped her into her coat, she left a note on the chalkboard that hung in the window, and they set off.

  A new wooden sled with red-painted runners waited at the edge of the street, and the tracks showed they’d pulled it all the way from Eden Street.

  “Which way?” she asked.

  Sam wore his revolver in a holster tethered to his right thigh. It was winter, and there were wild animals nearby. His precaution made her feel safe. “The land to the west, where it slopes toward Cowboy Creek, should be the best hill nearby. A good slope, and only a few trees.”

  As they plunged through the snow, Sam identified the tracks of several woodland animals for August. They saw a shaggy coyote slink away, and winter-white rabbits froze in place as they passed.

  “Someone finally came to apply for the assistant position yesterday,” she told Sam.

  “Have you reached a place with business where hiring someone is feasible?”

  “I think so. He’s young and has no medical experience, but I need help with heating water, cleaning, transporting the laundry, errands and the like. I mentioned I might only need him to work a few hours a day for now, and he agreed to that.”

  They approached a bank and trudged to reach the top, where they stood in a row and looked down.

  “This is perfect!” August squealed.

  “Looks like the ideal spot,” Sam agreed.

  Marlys’s stomach plunged, and her oatmeal felt like lead now. The long steep hill took her breath away. She’d never done anything like this before. The ideal spot?

  At her silence, they both turned to look at her, and she managed a weak smile.

  “Don’t you like it?” August asked.

  “It’s a marvelous hill. Now we’re going to get on the sled and ride down?”

  “Yep! Let’s show her how it’s done, Papa!”

  “Sitting up or lying down?” Sam asked.

  “Face first, o’course!” August replied.

  Sam made sure his woolen hat was sec
ure, then lay stomach down on the sled. August scrambled to lay atop him in the same head forward position. He wrapped his arms around his father.

  “What if there’s a rock or a limb under the snow that we can’t see?” Marlys asked.

  “We’ll hit it and fall off,” Sam replied, using his arms and hands to propel the sled forward. He rocked it back and forth a couple of times and then shoved with a grunt of exertion.

  Marlys’s heart leaped into her chest as she watched them shoot down the snowy hill with August’s high-pitched cry of excitement reverberating around the white-blanketed countryside. Holding her breath, she covered her face with her mittened hands as the duo neared the bottom, but immediately pulled her hands back down, lest the twosome crash and bleed and need her assistance.

  At the bottom, the sled skidded sideways, and they tumbled off into the snow. Laughing, they got to their feet.

  “That was great!” August cried and reached for the rope to help his dad pull their sled back up the hill.

  Near the top, Sam said, “After about a dozen times, this is the hard part.”

  “Your turn, Dr. Boyd!” August said gleefully.

  “You should probably start calling me Marlys,” she said.

  “Yes’m. You wanna ride down with me or with Papa?”

  She opened her eyes wide. “I don’t want to be the responsible one.”

  “It’s not that difficult,” Sam assured her. “But I’ll come with you so you can see what’s it’s like this first time. And we’ll sit up—less overwhelming for a beginner.” He promptly seated himself on the wooden sled. “You can’t steer well, so you have to use your weight, leaning one way or the other.”

  Marlys looked at August. He waved his mittened hand in impatience. “Go! Go!”

  She made sure her hat was secure, then lowered herself in her bulky fur coat behind Sam.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  As she’d ever be. “Yes.”

  Her heart pounded when he rocked the sled back and forward, then propelled it forward with the strength of his arms. Bits of snow hit her cheeks and the hillside blurred as they picked up speed. She buried her face in the back of Sam’s coat.