Healing Hearts (Easton Series #2)

by Murray, Anna

  “Yes sir,” she called from her station at the table. She was nearly finished with her efficient wrapping of boards on the broken limb.

  The sheriff set his hands on his hips and cleared his throat. “Jed, with this crowd it’s a darn good thing you’ve got Doctor Sutton.”

  “More like a darn good thing I sleep with my clothes on,” Jed grumbled.

  The sheriff grinned and Hannah’s cheeks flamed red.

  “Hell. I meant so I can be ready to treat patients at any hour.”

  “Yah, sure.” Easton’s chest began to rumble with laughter.

  “Often I do the same,” Hannah interjected, “because a doctor has to be ready to serve at a moment’s notice.”

  “Hmmm, that keeping-the-clothes on scheme explains the mystery of why you doctors don’t have mates or children,” Easton teased.

  The flush on Hannah’s face deepened.

  “We’re too busy taking care of everyone else’s wives and kids,” Jed barked.

  Easton raised his hands in mock surrender and laughed. “Whoa there, Doc. That’s my excuse for neglecting marital duty.”

  Roy Easton proceeded to move between Hannah and Jed as his services were needed. He fetched bandages and water, and he held back Elijah’s hair as Jed sat on a three-legged stool, facing the patient, preparing to stitch the man’s cut head.

  “You got whiskey for the pain?” Easton asked.

  “I gave him morphine, “ Hannah shot from behind.

  “I’m talking about Elijah,” Easton clarified.

  Jed looked up from his work. “Top shelf, left side.”

  Easton searched and found the bottle as Jed cleaned the wound with carbolic acid.

  Hannah’s patient was drifting off, and she turned to observe Jed’s case.

  “Will you give him the cure-all pill?”

  “What’s that?” quipped Jed.

  “Calomel. Mercury chloride. The blue mass. Don’t you regulars use it for everything?”

  He paused his stitching in mid air. “I did studies on it for Hammond.”

  Her gray eyes flew wide. “William Hammond? The Surgeon General?”

  Jed noted her delicate lashes and wondered how she’d hold up if she had to travel in a dust storm. “The same. He came around every now and again. We struck up a correspondence. He was concerned about the drugs.”

  “Wasn’t Hammond court martialed and fired in ’64?”

  Jed nodded. “The calomel we prescribed to sick soldiers gave them diarrhea. In truth, it made them sicker. I observed the bad effects on patients. I did a trial on it. Some I gave the drug and some I didn’t. Those without recovered faster. I sent my results to Hammond. Same thing with antimony.”

  “Antimony makes them retch to choke a horse,” Hannah noted.

  “Yes, but the purging did more harm than good. When Hammond removed the drugs from the Union medical corps supply list he was fired.”

  “I heard about it.” She wagged her head in disbelief.

  “Yes, well. The regulars would have none of it, and Hammond was caught between the regulars and sectarians and the drug company interests. By that time there were over 300 companies making drugs and war profiteering. You could say I’m a regular who now demands evidence to prove any potion works. During the war my positions often put me at odds with my colleagues. After the war I worked for a brief time with a doctor in the Minnesota territory, and he also believed in using what was practical and proven.”

  Hannah clapped her hands together and her expression was suddenly animated. “Good! When I learned you were an army surgeon I knew you had to be a regular, because all the Union docs were regulars who believed in the established, orthodox ways. I worried you might not accept my new thinking which bases treatment on observation and scientific methods.”

  His eyes danced with approval. “The war changed everything. We learned so much!” He looked back down at Elijah and punched the needle in to sew another stitch. “You’re still a woman,” he reminded himself aloud.

  Hannah wasn’t listening. Her eyes twinkled in the morning light, and she ran on excitedly. “Mind you, I’m not a homeopath, but I use their best ideas. Botanicals do work. I also don’t believe in using leeches to draw blood. It doesn’t bring down a fever any faster than not letting blood. It weakens the patient. I’d go as far as to say many have died from bleeding and purging methods.”

  Jed shook his head, and he pulled his eyes away from his patient to look into a face brightly lit with the hope and aspirations of a newly-minted doctor. The woman was much more than he’d given her at first glance. She was a mature thinker, ripe in mind as well as body. He found himself anticipating further discussions with her.

  Jed swallowed hard. “OK, Doctor Hannah. We got off on the wrong foot. I’ll let you stay and work for a week, but only until the next wagon out.”

  Chapter 4

  Three days passed, and Hannah quickly established a routine that wove around Jed’s sleeping and eating habits. She rose early and made breakfast, every day, even after a patient’s needs had interrupted her sleep. Jed was slower to rouse himself, but he always made it to the table, and between grunts he ate her eggs and fried pork and pancakes.

  As she worked alongside him, Hannah came to understand her confident and handsome, but somehow embittered and brooding, partner. His mood ran from hot to cold, as if he were emotionally rudderless. At one moment he could be laughing and smiling on the porch, beneath the stars on a moon-shadowed night, as they discussed the merits of her aural stethoscope with it’s fancy ivory earpieces and rubber tubing, versus his older model’s woven fabric tubing and wooden ear horns. Not a half hour later he’d be back in the surgery, shaking bottles in the lamplight and railing about how she’d used too much tincture of iodine on scraped knees presented by schoolboys.

  His vulnerability touched her deeply; he had a need, something she couldn’t put her finger on, but she’d keep searching. He’d known danger and suffering. But then again, so had she, and she’d persevered with her manners and humor intact.

  Hannah faced the man who was stabbing his breakfast sausage with steady surgical precision. “Doctor Rutherford, I’m grateful for the room upstairs, but I wish to share it – “

  “The cot is fine.” He swallowed. “I give you leave to call me Jed.” His raspy voice withered around his name, as if he wasn’t sure he liked the sound of it.

  “Oh, likewise, call me Hannah. Doctor Sutton is too formal.” Her lips curled. She didn’t need to remind him he’d avoided addressing her with a professional title. Sometimes she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Small steps, she told herself. Baby steps.

  Hannah didn’t dare ask him about the tintypes on the bureau in her bedroom. The dust-streaked photos from his previous life spoke of hardship and duty. Soldiers laden with bowie knives, blanket rolls, box knapsacks, and canteens stared blankly at the camera in the photographs. There were notes on the backsides: “My medical corps” and “5th regiment”, or simply a name of a colleague or patient.

  She’d also run across haunting photos of soldiers with missing limbs, carefully stacked in the top drawer. Hannah had seen such images during her training, but these were likely the cases Rutherford knew intimately. He’d documented the devastating effects of the minie balls, soft lead bullets that distorted on contact with flesh to create large entrance and exit wounds. These tore and mangled tissue and shattered bones, making amputation necessary because infection risk was high. Sacrifice of arms and legs had saved countless lives, but those lives would never be what they should have been.

  Hannah closed her eyes and shuddered. The war left so much devastation.

  She came back to the table when Jed’s voice broke through her dreary thoughts. He was saying something about a wedding. Her eyes searched his face. He was nursing his coffee and avoiding her eyes.

  “Pardon me, Doctor. Of what do you speak?”

  He smiled wryly. “Ned Kingman’s getting married today, in an hour. Cal
Easton beat me out for best man. Hard to believe, but anyway, we’re invited,” Jed muttered gruffly. “It’s a way for you to meet people,” he added. His blue eyes stared blankly at a speck on the wall.

  Her eyes widened, but she suppressed her pleasure at being asked to accompany him to such a special event. “You might have given me more notice.” She rose and yanked at the loose ties on her blue apron, ripping it from around her slim waist.

  Jed didn’t reply, so she turned to face the sink where she’d piled dirty plates. “Who’s Ned Kingman?”

  “War veteran. He manages accounts at the Mineral Creek ranch.”

  “Oh,” she shot over her shoulder, “he’s marrying someone you know?”

  “Ned plucked our spinster schoolteacher, Geneva Grayson. You’ll like her. She’s a lot like you.”

  The thrill she felt at being asked to the wedding faded. “I’m not a schoolmarm, so you must mean the spinster part,” Hannah bit off.

  A muscle tensed along his jaw. “Geneva isn’t at all what you’d expect. She’s pretty, smart, practical, loyal, hardheaded but kindhearted. A crack shot. Uncommon eyes. She’ll be a fine wife, and any man would be lucky to marry her.”

  Hannah turned to face him and smiled. He wouldn’t be asking her to meet the town if he were serious about his plan to send her off in four days, would he? “Well then, they’ll share a good life.”

  He nodded. “Bound to . . . Ned’s an eager groom. He’s been courting her for the better part of a year.”

  Hannah swallowed. “Excuse me, I need to dress and repair my hair.” Hannah wiped her hands on a towel and headed for the stairs.

  * * *

  Hannah wore her best cream cotton dress with lace overlay. Her dark hair was twisted into a French braid and pinned under in a fashionable coif. Jed’s blue eyes widened in approval, and Hannah was equally pleased with his attire – a clean white cotton shirt with gray vest and wool pants. He wore a dark Stetson hat to match boots polished to a black shine. Hannah thought he could pass as going-to-Sunday-meeting cowboy, right down to the damp ends of his sun-streaked brown hair touching lightly at his collar.

  “Doctor Sutton.” His voice hitched as if he were trying to catch his breath. He offered his arm. Her smile brightened, and she slipped her hand into the crook.

  “Doctor Rutherford.” She mocked seriousness as they stepped out the door and walked through puddles of sunshine splattered between buildings, to the little church on the other side of the town.

  He jerked a thumb in the direction of the church. “We don’t have call for fancy balls or afternoon teas.”

  She shook her head. “That suits me. I’m partial to an occasional modest social with close friends and family.”

  He smiled.

  “You look beautiful.”

  His words knocked the breath out of her. The man wasn’t what she’d expected. At times he was normally hard and coarse and harsh, but today he was bright and sincere and gentlemanly. Above it all, his heart was reflected in those blue eyes, shining warm and deep. They reminded her of the sky on a summer day, holding wide dreams she had no right to ponder but relished in this unguarded moment anyway.

  “You clean up nice yourself,” she choked, and her cheeks reddened. She forced herself not to stare. Uh, you’ll have to help me with the names and faces,” Hannah put forth.

  “No problem. The groom is Ned, and the bride is Geneva. You’ll meet the rest of the Easton clan. You already know the sheriff, Roy. His older brother, Cal, runs the Mineral Creek Ranch, and he’ll be Ned’s best man. He’s tall like his brother, and his word is better than a handshake. Cal’s wife is Sarah. You’ll recognize her because she’ll be carrying a month-old baby named Thomas.” He winked. “Yes, I delivered him.”

  Hannah’s lips curved up. “Sounds like good people.”

  “The best. Sarah’s blond little sister is Emily. Roy dotes on her like crazy. Sarah and Emily were orphan sisters, and the Eastons took them in.”

  “That’s very fine,” she whispered.

  He cleared his throat. “And you know the Watkins clan, from the store.”

  She nodded and cast a sidelong glance, studying him beneath lowered lashes. “I also know the Wrights from the bank.”

  “Yes. They’ll be there, and --“

  “Doc!” A strange voice hailed them, stopping them in their tracks.

  Jed and Hannah turned in unison to see a figure approaching from a side street.

  Jed touched his hat brim as the stout man approached like a ship coming over the horizon. “John. On your way to the wedding?” The men shook hands.

  “Yes I am, and Nelda Rose will be joining me right soon.” The man was wearing his Sunday best, and his hair was clumped in combed lines above his broad freckled face.

  Jed cocked his head toward Hannah. “John, this is Doctor Hannah Sutton. Hannah, this is John Hawkins. Mr. Hawkins owns the hotel. He runs it with his lovely wife, Nelda Rose. She plays the piano for visitors in the parlor.”

  “Pleased to meet you.” Hannah stuck out a hand after recovering from the stricken look she’d seen as it flashed across John Hawkins face. The man, who still looked like he’d seen a ghost, pumped her hand with an iron grip.

  “I heard you’re Doc’s new partner, Doctor Hannah! Is it all right to say Doctor Hannah? It’s what folks are calling you.”

  Hannah was pleased to hear the now-familiar moniker. “I like that. Thank you.”

  “No use bothering with a last name! A lucky man’s going to change yours soon enough.”

  Hannah felt blood rush to her cheeks. “Oh, I-I have no time for such pursuits.”

  John Hawkins’ nervous laugh was low and hearty. “You don’t need time. You’ll get a bushel of offers at your door.”

  Jed moved impatiently and kicked at the dirt. “We better get a move on, or we’ll miss the fanfare and vows.”

  “Right. I’ll see you there. I have to stop at the store first.” Hawkins adjusted his hat and moved away.

  Jed latched onto Hannah’s arm and herded her across the street to the little church. She looked down at the hem of her dress. It had turned brown from the street dust.

  Benches dragged from the school were lined up outside for a reception. They entered and took a seat in a middle pew. Hannah whacked at the bottom of her skirt.

  “What are you doing?” Jed’s low voice rumbled.

  “Shaking dirt off my skirt.”

  “Dirt is your new friend. Get used to it, but don’t bring it into the surgery.”

  After a few minutes the doors closed and an older than usual couple walked to the front of the congregation. Hannah saw a minister appear from a side door. The ritual commenced, and it lasted only ten minutes. The bride cried after she repeated her vows.

  “They have a sweet story,” Jed whispered. “I pulled a bullet from Ned’s leg.” His voice was hoarse.

  “Come on,” he jumped up at the end of the ceremony. “Let’s get to the front of the line so we can get through and leave early, if we have to, of course.”

  “It’s ok. I don’t mind. Really. I like meeting new people.” She couldn’t figure what he thought he’d rescue her from; maybe he was trying to save the town from thinking she’d become be a permanent citizen, but then why drag her to the wedding in the first place? After all, the job was about getting to know people, and their lives. Hannah had always enjoyed delving into the whole person -- and that included Doc Rutherford . . . if she could pull down the wall he put up to shield himself from authentic feelings.

  They moved through the door, hugged the bride and groom, and shook hands with the best man, Cal, and his wife, Sarah, and the minister. As they edged down the line Jed formally introduced “Doctor Hannah Sutton”, and she received a warm clutch and curious welcome from each guest. More importantly, she observed the respect shown to Jed. It seemed he’d touched nearly every life in some way; the truth about his position in the community shone in young and old eyes alike. Finally, after a man wi
th scars on his hands thanked Jed, she jokingly asked her colleague if he’d be turning water into wine. He laughed, deeply, and she realized it was for the first time since she’d met him.

  The crowd spread into the churchyard for the toast and reception. She was soon separated from Jed, and, despite her best efforts, Hannah attracted a swarm of bachelor men. Some simply smiled shyly, but the bolder amongst them lit up about manly work injuries and ailments they’d conquered. They weren’t given to flowery prose but their message was clear: They were lonely and starved for womanly attention. Affection flowed easily from these prairie suitors, yet Hannah was embarrassed and responded awkwardly.

  After waiting an appropriate eternity, Hannah excused herself from the circle of men, and she pushed toward a gaggle of women, where there was much cooing over Sarah Easton’s new baby. Jed appeared again and introduced Hannah to Sarah Easton and her young sister, Emily. She remembered Ella Wright from the bank, and for the first time she met pretty Nelda Rose Hawkins, wife of the innkeeper she’d met on the way to the wedding.

  Nelda Rose was visibly in the family way, and she pulled Hannah aside.

  Taking a shaking breath, the tiny woman with auburn hair and green eyes made an odd request. “Doctor Hannah, I want you to bring this baby. Rutherford speaks highly of you, and --”

  Hannah’s eyebrow arched. “He said that?” She checked herself. “This is your first?”

  Nelda’s round face tightened and her eyes filled. “Third. I lost two.”

  “I’m sorry.” Hannah reached down and touched the woman’s shoulder. ”Miscarriage?”

  Nelda Rose frowned. “The f-first one. Then my boy died after three days.”

  Oh God. Hannah was careful to maintain a pleasant countenance. “Get enough rest and eat meat.”

  The woman brightened. “John won’t let me work past supper.”

  “I can see he’s a good man.”

  “That he is.” Nelda made the sign of the cross, bringing her hand from forehead to heart and sweeping across her shoulders. Her jade eyes glistened.

  Hannah didn’t put much stock in religious faith, but she knew the proper response. “I’ll pray for your baby.”