Fletcher's Woman

by Linda Lael Miller

  She sighed, raising one of Clovis’s gold-trimmed china teacups to her lips as she watched Griffin walking through the rain. I love you, she called after him, in aching silence.

  But then, just as Athena was certain that she’d have to bolt from the Sheridan’s porch and run after Griffin Fletcher like a hussy, Clovis appeared. As usual, she was far too observant.

  “I honestly don’t know what you see in that rude, tiresome young man, Athena,” she piped, some private outrage snapping in her eyes. “Why, if you’d seen how he ruined poor Mr. Wilke’s beautiful wedding, and the frightful thing he did in church—”

  Athena’s interest rose. She’d heard Jonas’s grudging account of the aborted wedding ceremony, but the church episode was something new. “What happened—in church, I mean?”

  Clovis shuddered at the memory. “Naturally, we were all upset that Field Hollister took an Indian for a bride—he’d gotten my Ruby’s hopes up, you know—and I, for one, wanted to let him know what I thought.”

  “Would you believe it, Griffin Fletcher came marching up that aisle—as if he ever set foot in a church willingly—with a bundle of rocks! Mind you, he thrust one of those boulders at me and said, ‘Clovis, cast the first stone.’”

  Athena affected a cough, so that she could cover her mouth with one hand.

  Clovis, having raised four daughters, was not fooled by the tactic. “Laugh if you will, but if there’s anybody in this town more downright sinful than Griffin Fletcher, I’d like to know about it!”

  “Sinful?” Athena managed, swallowing hard. “Griffin?”

  Clovis nodded smartly. “He’s been courting one of those Tent Town women, Athena. And she’s Becky McKinnon’s daughter in the bargain!”

  He’s been doing more than courting, Athena thought, and suddenly, it wasn’t difficult at all to keep from smiling. In fact, she completely lost patience. “Oh, Clovis, don’t be so dreary. You’re just peeved because he didn’t marry one of your daughters!”

  Clovis flushed bright red and sputtered, “Athena, that was an impertinent thing to say! Is that the way ladies talk in France?”

  Athena reminded herself that there were no hotels in Providence and softened her tone, in an attempt to mollify her hostess. “No,” she said. “It’s not the way ladies talk anywhere. I’m sorry.”

  Pleased, Clovis patted her hand. “Never you mind, dear. Never you mind. And if you want Griffin Fletcher’s attentions, there is only one thing to do. We’ll have a party!”

  The prospect was not heartening. “Griffin hates parties,” Athena mourned. He probably couldn’t be dragged away from those shabby tents, anyway, she added in her mind.

  Clovis shrugged, and once again, there was a flash of petulance in her eyes. “He hasn’t attended a single one of mine,” she admitted. But then her face brightened suddenly, and she chirped. “You must get sick!”

  A smile curved Athena’s full lips. Lord knew, pestilence was the one thing Griffin couldn’t resist. “I do feel a little ill,” she said.

  Within thirty minutes, Athena was ensconced in Clovis’s guest room bed, looking very ill indeed.

  • • •

  Grumbling, Griffin pulled his watch from his vest pocket and glared at it. It was nearly six-thirty, and he hadn’t even had a chance to mention Rachel’s supper invitation to Molly.

  He squared his shoulders. Well, he would see what was wrong at the Sheridan place and then go home and change clothes. With luck, he could still be at Rachel’s before seven.

  The rain that had braced him before was little more than an annoyance now. Griffin strode through it, irritated, wondering which one of Clovis’s daughters had eaten herself into a stupor this time.

  By the time he pounded at the front door of Judge Sheridan’s house, his mood was downright foul. “What is it?” he snapped, when Clovis admitted him.

  Her chin quivered a little, and Griffin noted, with amusement, that she hadn’t forgiven him for his last visit to this house, during Jonas’s “wedding,” or for the scene he’d created with the stones after Field had announced his marriage.

  “Our houseguest,” she said stiffly, “is suffering some affliction.”

  Griffin rubbed his eyes with the index finger and thumb of his left hand and sighed. “Lead the way, Clovis. I don’t have all night.”

  The judge’s wife gave him a sullen look and gestured toward the stairway. “In the guest room, Dr. Fletcher—where my Ruby was when His Honor had to summon you that night.”

  Griffin remembered, and he suppressed a grin as he moved toward the stairs. There had been a memorable fuss that snowy winter night; Clovis and the Judge had rousted him out of bed at an hour unconscionable even for a country doctor, convinced that their thirty-two-year-old “child” was dying a hideous death. In actuality, Griffin discovered, Ruby had consumed two dried apple pies all by herself and needed nothing more than a lecture and a cathartic.

  He was still smiling when he rapped at the door of the upstairs bedroom.

  “Come in, Doctor,” said a tremulous voice—a disturbingly familiar voice.

  Griffin obeyed, stopped cold when he saw Athena peering at him over the edge of a blue satin comforter. There was a decidedly healthy glint in the wide indigo eyes, and the room lacked the subtle smell that marked genuine illness.

  “You,” he said flatly.

  Athena batted her thick eyelashes. “Well, I am sick, Griffin,” she insisted, a sort of peevish mischief sounding in her voice.

  Griffin’s muscles thawed, and he stepped inside the room, placed his medical bag on a bureau, and folded his arms. “Undeniably,” he agreed, making no move to approach the bed.

  Her lower lip trembled, belying the bright deviltry in her eyes. “You don’t believe me!” she accused.

  Griffin thought of the three children in Tent Town, who might need him at any moment, and of Rachel, expecting him to share one rational, ordinary evening with her. His anger was cold and hard within him. “Of course I don’t believe you. What is it that you really want, Athena?”

  She sat up in bed, and the comforter made a whispering sound as it moved away from her chin to reveal her creamy white shoulders and the cleft between her breasts. “All right, I should have known I couldn’t fool you. But you’re so cussed, Griffin Fletcher, that I honestly didn’t see how I could manage even a moment alone with you unless I was perishing from some plague!”

  Mechanically, Griffin took out his watch, consulted it. Fifteen minutes—Rachel was expecting him in fifteen minutes. “I fail to see what you would want with me, Athena. If memory serves me correctly, I was always the last thing on your mind.”

  Athena closed her eyes, and for once, her expression looked genuine. The color drained from her face, and her lips were drawn tight across her perfect, white teeth. “Oh, Griffin, I was a fool, and I know it. Can’t you please forgive me?”

  Griffin sighed. “It’s not a matter of forgiveness anymore, Athena—maybe it never was. I simply don’t feel anything toward you.”

  The dark blue eyes flew open now, flashing, fierce, in the half-light of the room. Rain sheeted the windows and assaulted the roof. “Because of Rachel McKinnon!”

  He took his bag into one hand again, prepared to leave. “Athena, you made your choice. You wanted Jonas. And that happened a long time before I even knew Rachel existed.”

  The low, even tone of Griffin’s words did nothing to assuage Athena. “I didn’t want Jonas!” she cried, in outraged frustration. “I wanted you—I wanted a husband—not some humanitarian fool who would turn his back on a timber empire to play nursemaid to a lot of ne’er-do-wells!”

  The indifference Griffin felt surprised even him. He’d been mad enough to kill the night he’d come back from San Francisco, heard the gossip before he’d even walked the length of the wharf, and stormed out to Jonas’s house to find Athena cavorting merrily in the wrong bed. Now, the memory stirred nothing within him—not even detached contempt.

  He laughed hoa
rsely, at Athena, at Jonas, at himself. “You were punishing me for refusing my father’s generous bequest, weren’t you? You went to bed with Jonas because I wouldn’t give up medicine to fall timber and squire you all over Europe on the proceeds.”

  Athena threw back her covers, half-hysterical in her fury. “Fool!” she shrieked. “You could have been rich!”

  Griffin scanned her trembling, shapely body once, and was unmoved by its nakedness. If anything, he felt clinical boredom.

  He laughed again. “Good-bye, Athena,” he said. And then he turned and walked out.

  Something shattered against the framework of the doorway, fell to the floor in a tinkling shower. Griffin was still laughing when he bounded out into the rain.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Mary Louisa Clifford, one of the Tent Town wives, was waiting patiently, her dress and hair soaked with rain, when Griffin reached the Sheridan’s front gate. “Doctor—” she began awkwardly, her hands twisting the sodden fabric of her skirts, “Doctor, it’s my little girl. She’s got fever so bad that she doesn’t know me.”

  Griffin forgot Athena then, and he forgot Rachel, in the bargain. He took Mary Louisa’s arm and propelled her back along the board sidewalk, toward Tent Town, shouting questions about the child’s symptoms over the pounding song of the rain.

  Fawn Hollister was sitting beside the little girl’s cot when Griffin and Mary Louisa hurried into the tent, and the look in her brave brown eyes stopped both of them cold.

  “It’s too late,” she said.

  Mary Louisa shrieked in her grief, and the sound mobilized Griffin, thrust him toward the still, tiny form on the cot. “Do something,” he hissed, even though Fawn was already moving toward the stricken woman, already drawing her into an embrace.

  Griffin knelt beside the cot, laid his ear to the child’s chest. No heartbeat.

  He swore, tilted the little girl’s head back, and bent to breathe air into her nose and mouth. Behind him, the unearthly wailing went on. And on.

  Griffin pressed the tiny chest with the heel of his palm, willing the heart to beat again. For some minutes, he continued the treatment, alternating between breathing into the child’s lungs and prodding her heart.

  His reward was a ragged, almost inaudible gasp, a fluttering in the small, waxen face.

  “What is her name?” he demanded, of the now-silent woman behind him.

  “Alice,” said Mary Louisa, in a raw whisper.

  Griffin laid his head on Alice’s chest again, heard a tremulous, thready beat. He raised his head, cautiously hopeful. “Alice!” he ordered crisply. “Listen to me! Your mama is standing here, and she wants you to come back—Alice, come back.”

  The child gave a small, shuddering sigh, and some of the color came back into her face. “Back—” she murmured.

  “That’s right,” urged Griffin, more gently now. “Please—come back.”

  Alice’s eyelids fluttered; the battle was visible in her small, pale face.

  Griffin laid a hand on her forehead. “That’s right,” he said.

  For the time being, Mary Louisa Clifford’s little girl was home again. Griffin stood up, raised his eyes to the sodden, dripping roof of the tent.

  Alice was by no means out of danger, and in some ways, turning to face her mother’s joyous relief would be difficult. There was never any assurance of recovery, even under ideal conditions—and the conditions in that place certainly weren’t ideal.

  Mary Louisa was beside him, tugging at his shirtsleeve, staring in wonder at the sleeping child. “Doctor?” she pleaded.

  Griffin forced himself to look at the woman. “She’s still critically ill,” he said. “And this tent—”

  “Griffin?” Fawn interrupted, her voice small and constricted. “Griffin, she would be warm at our house.”

  He turned so quickly that the motion startled both women. “No,” he said sharply, struggling to bring the churning emotions inside him under some kind of tenuous control. “No, Fawn—influenza is contagious. If possible, I want it confined to Tent Town.”

  Something moved in Fawn’s throat, and her brown eyes darkened with pain. “My cottage, then. The one I lived in when—”

  Wanting to spare her, Griffin looked away from her face swiftly, taking an intense interest in the smoking kerosene lamp standing on a shipping crate in the center of the tent. “Yes,” he said, gruffly. “That’s a good idea. If you’ll go up there and get a fire going, I’ll bring Alice in the buggy.”

  Fawn hastened to comply, while Mary Louisa searched in vain for a dry blanket in which to wrap her daughter. In the end, Griffin found his suit coat stuffed underneath his buggy seat and bundled Alice in that.

  At the door of the Clifford tent, he came face to face with a pale, agitated Field. “The Robertsons are all sick, Griffin,” he whispered, looking down at the tiny form in his friend’s arms. “And Lucas is worse.”

  Griffin swore softly, thrust the child from his arms to Field’s. “Take her to Jonas’s cottage, Field,” he said, meeting the blue gaze squarely. “Fawn is there, getting things ready.”

  A muscle tightened in Field’s jaw, but he showed no other visible reaction to the mention of a place he had every reason to hate. “Is there anything you want me to do after that?”

  Griffin was already moving around him, toward the Robertsons’ tent. “Yes,” he barked. “I’ve got some quinine at home—Molly will know where. Bring me all of it.”

  The situation in the next tent was grim. Mrs. Robertson was already dead, and her four children weren’t far behind. The smallest, an infant boy, had succumbed by the time Field returned with the requested quinine.

  Griffin gave the other three children doses of a medicine he knew was often ineffective, swearing under his breath all the while. There was nothing to offer them, besides quinine and the relative warmth of Jonas’s vacant brick cottage.

  Tirelessly, Field drove back and forth between the center of Tent Town and the little house where his wife had once served Jonas Wilkes’ voracious appetites, never complaining, carrying the stricken children Griffin pointed out as tenderly as if they were his own.

  If Griffin had had time, he would have admired his friend for his selfless devotion to a cause that was largely hopeless.

  • • •

  Rachel stood at the saloon’s front window, staring out at the darkness, disappointment thick in her throat and hot behind her eyes. She could not look at Mamie when the woman’s gentle hand came to rest on her arm.

  “You know how it is with doctors,” the cook said softly. “He’s probably real busy someplace.”

  Rachel swallowed, but the hurt was stuck fast; it wouldn’t go down, and it wouldn’t permit words to pass.

  “You come and eat some supper now, ’fore you get peaked,” urged Mamie, her voice low and motherly and unbearably gentle. “I’ve been keepin’ everything warm.”

  Rachel shook her head, miserably, unwilling to leave her post at the window. “I’m not hungry,” she managed, after a struggle.

  “Nonsense, Child. Now, you come away from that window this instant and have some supper.”

  Just as Rachel was about to decline the suggestion again, she saw a dark form moving through the rain, toward the saloon. She wrenched open the doors to find Field Hollister standing on the porch, dripping wet.

  “Rachel—Griffin said—”

  Rachel reached out, pulled Field into the warmth of the silent saloon. “Look at you!” she cried, pulling off his drenched coat without ceremony. “You’ll die of pneumonia, Field Hollister!”

  “I’ll get some coffee,” said Mamie, hurrying away toward the kitchen.

  Field ran one sleeve across his face, trying in vain to wipe away the rain. He’d been running, apparently, for his breath came in ragged gasps and his cheeks were florid. When Mamie handed him a cup of coffee, he choked on the first gulp.

  Rachel was terribly frightened. “Field, please—what is it?”

  Suddenly, t
here was a wan smile in his blue eyes. “Griffin can’t come to supper,” he said.

  “Don’t take no genius to see that,” commented Mamie, in good-natured irritation. “Must be midnight by now.”

  Field had caught his breath, and there was no trace of a smile in his features now—just weariness and despair and some emotion Rachel didn’t recognize. “There’s influenza in Tent Town,” he explained, at last, between cautious sips of coffee. “Griffin couldn’t get away.”

  Rachel forgot her disappointment over the supper she and Mamie had labored over and stared up at Field. “How bad is it?”

  Field’s eyes were haunted. “It’s very bad, Rachel. A woman and her baby are dead, and Griffin thinks there will be more gone before morning.”

  “I’m going over there!” Rachel cried, turning to look desperately around the room for a cloak.

  But Field had set aside his coffee, and he clasped both her shoulders in firm hands. “No,” he said flatly. “Griffin said you’re to stay away.”

  Rachel twisted free. “Griffin said, Griffin said!” she mocked hotly. “Griffin Fletcher is not God, and I don’t care what he said!”

  “Well you’d better!” Field yelled back. “If you go over there, you risk coming down with influenza yourself! And if there is one thing Griffin doesn’t need, it’s another patient!”

  Subdued, remembering the child that was, in all likelihood, growing under her heart, Rachel felt a sob rise in her throat and break free. “There must be something I can do to help.”

  Field nodded, making a visible effort to calm himself. “There are a couple of things. You can give us every blanket you can spare, and you can pray.”

  It felt good to be busy, wrenching blankets from beds and shelves, folding them, helping Mamie pare vegetables for a gigantic pot of nourishing soup. But, all the while, Rachel wished that she could be beside Griffin, helping him.

  “He can’t do it alone,” she whispered brokenly, when Field had returned, with a wagon, and taken the blankets.

  Mamie was stirring the soup, which Field had agreed to come back for later. “Dr. Fletcher? That man is made out of granite, Child. I’ve seen him work for days without stopping.”