by Paul Bagdon
“I’m Dr. David Oliver. Your legs were turning to rubber outside my office. I brought you in here and took the cataplasm off your hand. I think I got all the infection, and if I didn’t, what I poured into the incisions I had to make will take care of it. The cataplasm was a good idea—maybe a very good idea.”
“Cataplasm?” Jake croaked.
“You probably call it a poultice. It was drawing pus well. I don’t doubt that you saved your hand with it.” He smiled ruefully at Jake. “Thank God for chloroform. I had to gouge around in there like a drunken coal miner.”
“I’ve got money—federal gold eagles—in my boots. I can pay . . .”
The doctor grinned, his well-shaved face moving away from Jake. “You must have spoken with Yappy Tolliver. The damned fool wanted me to treat his piles and offered me a mangy-looking duck and a half bushel of potatoes in payment. I told him to shove the duck up his ass and see if that helped. Since then Yappy has been telling anybody who’ll listen that I’ll only work for cold hard cash on the barrelhead.”
Jake began to struggle up to a sitting position, but the doctor put a gentle hand on his chest, easing him back. “Not yet—and I want you in the bed right here for a couple of days. Your right hand and forearm are attached to a board and I want it to stay there for at least forty-eight hours. I’ll be checking it until then. Lie back and get some rest. I’ll help you over to the bed in an hour or so and get some water in you, too.”
The doctor was a compact man of about forty, broad-shouldered and wide-hipped, but with no sign of fat. His dark brown hair showed some gray at his temples and his eyes were clear and piercing. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up. Jake’s eyes stopped there. The physician’s left arm was a short, shriveled appendage, the hand curled in on itself. Oliver caught his gaze. “That’s why I’m not in the army surgical corps,” he said. “I offered to take any kind of skill and proficiency test they wanted, but those mindless bureaucrats in Washington . . .” He let the sentence die. “What’s your name?” he asked after a moment.
“Jake.”
“Just Jake? That’s a pretty fancy horse out there for a fellow with but one name.”
“Jake’s enough.”
The doctor grinned, showing even white teeth. “Maybe so. I had the mare taken down to the stable—she’ll be well cared for.” He walked to the door. “Get some rest, Jake. I’ve got other patients to tend to, and then I’ll be back to get you settled in bed. My wife will bring you some water. Drink all she brings.”
The doctor’s wife was younger than Jake expected her to be. She was a fine-looking woman of about thirty with long black hair and large chestnut eyes. He estimated her to be at least three inches taller than her husband. “I’m Maggie,” she said. “Doc’s wife and nurse and general handyman and cook, too.” Her smile was open and kind and warm. “Doc says you had quite an infection.” She handed him a large glass of water.
“I guess I did,” Jake said, taking the glass. He raised his head as far as he was able but still dribbled water on his chest as he emptied the glass. Maggie leaned forward with a white cloth and swabbed away the spill. “You rest now,” she said.
When Maggie had closed the door behind herself Jake inspected Doc Oliver’s work. His arm was secured to a piece of sanded board about a foot and a half long and five inches wide by wraps of thick gauze. Spots of blood seeped through the gauze in places, spotting the whiteness. Jake brought the back of his hand to his nose; the only smell was a pungent, medicinal scent. He lowered his arm down next to his body and closed his eyes, doubting very much that he’d sleep.
The gentle touch of a hand at his shoulder awakened Sinclair, and his eyes popped open. Doc was again looking down at him. Jake blinked several times: The texture of the light had changed from bright afternoon sunlight to almost late dusk. An oil lamp hung from a metal hook across the room. “I guess I slept,” he said.
“You did—soundly and for several hours. Let’s get you into the infirmary and I’ll check my work.”
The infirmary was a good-sized room down a hall that contained three vacant beds separated by cloth screens. Next to the head of each bed was a small table, and next to each was a straight-backed chair. Doc supported Jake as he guided him to the last bed in the line. “Lie down and I’ll get your boots off,” he said. “And your pants, too. Maggie will wash them tomorrow. Looks like you pissed yourself while you slept,” he observed. Jake looked away, blushing.
“Nothing to be ashamed of,” Doc said. “Shows the plumbing’s working as it should.” When Jake was prone on the bed minus his boots and pants, the physician drew a light sheet over him. “I have your money from inside your boots,” he said. “It’ll be safe with me. I’ll have Maggie go over to the mercantile and pick up a shirt for you tomorrow. I’ll leave water here on the table by your left hand, where you can reach it. No food until tomorrow, though.” He brought a lamp closer to Jake and peered at his arm. “Looks like my sutures are holding. Get some sleep.” Before Jake could answer, the doctor was walking away from him toward the main part of the house. Both Jake and Doc Oliver flinched as the throaty, percussive boom of a heavy-caliber rifle destroyed the silence of the late evening. “Drunken damned fools,” Doc said, turning back to Jake before he could ask a question. “There was a marksmanship contest on the Fourth of July, and a few of the men seem to have stuck around. Every evening it’s the same thing. They get liquored up, put their bets on the table, and go out to shoot.” Another report rolled through the town, and then, quickly, another. “They’ll quit when it’s full dark,” Doc said. “Then you can sleep.”
The sporadic gunfire continued until it was so dark that Jake couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. The shooting stopped but it seemed to echo in Jake’s ears, in his mind. Instantly, he was back in battle.
It was strange. He could always hear Uriah, even over the furor of battle. “There—at ten o’clock, that’s an officer near the artillery piece—easy shot, Jake . . . His men are loading canister—they’re blowing our flank’s asses off. . . .” Toole leaned forward and spat on the barrel of Jake’s Sharps, up near the front sight. “Still cool enough for a couple rounds, Jake—my spit ain’t dancing yet. . . .”
Then, suddenly, Jake faced his father across the great room in their home.
“You ran, Son. You turned tail on your obligation to protect all this—the way we live, our country, what we believe.” The man’s face had aged terribly; his eyes were infinitely sad—and tinged with disgust.
“It wasn’t like that, Pa. I couldn’t watch it anymore, I couldn’t do what I’d been doing anymore. All that killing for what, Pa? A goddamn political argument between Abe Lincoln and Jeff Davis? Give them each a bowie and let them fight it out, stop the boys from killing each other.”
“You ran, boy. No son of mine runs from a fight.”
“Jake? Jake?”
Maggie Oliver’s voice tugged Sinclair from sleep. Morning sun cascaded through the window at the end of the infirmary, bright enough to cause a man to squint.
“I have your pants here and a new shirt. Doc says you can get dressed now. You do that and I’ll fetch you some breakfast. Hungry, are you?”
Jake considered for a moment. “Ma’am,” he said. “I could eat one of my boots and get a good start on the second one.”
Maggie laughed, the sound as pretty and as fine as good music. She placed the shirt and pants on the chair. “Careful now as you dress. You’re likely to be dizzy.” Jake sat up clumsily, his right arm and the board it was attached to feeling as big and as awkward as the trunk of a hundred-year-old oak. Maggie was right about the dizziness, but it passed quickly. It felt good to have some clothes on when she came back with a tray of ham and eggs and thick slices of buttered dark bread. The aroma of the large mug of coffee reached out to him. He moved carefully to the chair and balanced the tray in his lap. “Doc’s birthing a baby,” Maggie told him. “He’ll be back before too long. He said you’re to eat and then
rest. No walking around except to the privy. I’ll bring a pitcher of water. Doc says to keep drinking, thirsty or not.” She took a folded newspaper from where it’d been tucked under her arm and placed it on the bed. “Here’s something to read, if you’ve a mind to. It’s all war news, I’m afraid.”
Jake ate everything on the tray before he reached for the paper. Under the masthead of the Penderton Advisor the headline was stark, in huge black font across the top of the page:
CONFEDERATES ROUTED IN BLOODY CONFRONTATION;
HEROIC UNION TROOPS REPEL MASSIVE ASSAULT!
Jake began to read the account and then put the paper aside, realizing that the writer probably hadn’t been within a hundred miles of the battle. He had the fighting taking place in the town—from house to house—and mentioned nothing about Pickett or the final charge. The casualty count by the reporter was absolutely insane: He cited over twenty thousand Union men killed, wounded, or missing, and over eighteen thousand for the Confederates. Photographs taken by Matthew Brady, renowned photographer of the Great War, would appear in subsequent editions of the Advisor, the text promised. Sinclair sighed and put the newspaper aside.
Doc Oliver was rumpled and tired when he showed up at about midday. He unwrapped the gauze from Jake’s arm and inspected his work. Behind Jake’s knuckles were a series of perhaps ten or a dozen inch-to two-inch-long series of neatly tied sutures. The swelling was down and there was no stink of infection. The skin, however, was reddened and stretched, particularly between the lines of sutures. “Looks very good,” Doc said. He removed the cap from a blue glass jar and spread a thick, sharp-smelling ointment over the injured areas. “Bovine bag balm,” he said. “Works better than any of the salves the medical suppliers in Chicago sell—at about a quarter of the price.” He rewrapped the hand and arm and secured it, once again, to the board. Noting the disappointment in Jake’s eyes, he said, “Look—everything is fine so far. You got off real lucky, Jake. The trauma area needs to be immobilized for at least another day. Today I want you to spend most of your time on your bed. We’ll see about tomorrow when it gets here.”The doctor stood and wearily put his hands to his lower back.“Like I said, you’re very lucky. Don’t screw up my good work now.”
Waiting to heal was about as interesting to Jake Sinclair as watching moss grow on a damp rock. There was very little pain in his right hand and forearm, but the itching was intense, maddening in a sense, worse than pain. The day dragged. He dozed a few times but dreamed of using a handful of rough straw to scour away the incessant itching. Maggie brought him lunch and then dinner but apparently was too busy in the office with Doc to stop to visit. Late in the afternoon gunfire sounded—at first that of standard-caliber rifles and then the more muscular reports of a Sharps or similar weapon. Every once in a while a whoop or a burst of laughter reached Jake and the tinkling of a honkytonk piano was just barely audible if the breeze was right. The shooting stopped after dark. The frequency of the yells and braying laughter increased as the night progressed, but it was never quite loud enough to be annoying. In truth, the laughter sounded good to Jake. Men laugh differently, more quietly, with less joy, before or after a battle. It’s nervous laughter then, with none of the release of whiskey and fun behind it. Hell, Uriah and I hadn’t really laughed together for a couple of months before Gettysburg—even when we came across some whiskey.
Jake Sinclair was wide awake, hungry, thirsty, and very surly when Doc Oliver looked in on him the following morning. “This goddamn itching, Doc,” Jake greeted the physician, “is going to drive me crazy! It doesn’t let up for a second. I didn’t sleep a wink all night. . . .”
“Strange.” Doc grinned. “The two times I looked in on you, you were sleeping as sound as a federal dollar. And,” he added, “the itching is a good sign. It means things are healing up. Let’s take a look.” He quickly removed the gauze, freeing the arm. “Swelling’s way down, no sign the infection has returned. Move your fingers.”
Jake complied, feeling some stiffness and some resistance.“Doesn’t itch so bad with the dressing off,” he said.
“Make a fist,” Doc said.
Jake’s knuckles smarted and his skin felt tight and hot, but he formed a good fist. He turned his clenched hand over and then back again, gazing down at it as if it were his first newborn son. “Thanks, Doc,” he said.
“Sure. Keep it clean and there’s no need to wrap it. My services and your stay here are going to cost you six dollars. Maggie will bring you your change from the forty dollars in your boots. You’re ready to go, Jake. If you’re still in town in a week, come back and I’ll remove the stitches. If you’re not, cut them and pluck them out yourself. There’s nothing to it. Just don’t leave them in longer than a week.”
Jake stood from the bedside chair. “I won’t forget this, Doc.”
“Sure you will.” Oliver smiled. “In a year or so all you’ll remember is the doc with one arm who charged you six dollars for doing next to nothing.” He put his hand on Jake’s shoulder. “I won’t offer to shake with you, Jake No Last Name—at least until the stitches are out. I’ll wish you well, though.”
The livery stable—Jake’s first stop after leaving Doc Oliver’s office—smelled of good hay and polished leather and the scent of healthy horses. Jake looked over Mare, asked that her shoes be reset, and checked his saddle. He paid the blacksmith’s boarding rate of sixty-five cents per day, and said he’d be by in the morning to get her. As Jake was leaving the barn, the smith was leading Mare to the front work area where his forge and anvil were located.
The sun was strong on Jake’s back as he walked from the stables to the Penderton Hotel. He took a room on the second floor, paid his dollar in advance as required, dragged the wooden chair that was, other than the bed, the only piece of furniture in the room to the curtainless window and sat down. Rooms with dressers were ten cents per night extra. “I won’t be here long enough to need a dresser,” he’d told the clerk.
He watched men go in and out of the saloon for the balance of the afternoon. Most of the day trade was farmers sneaking off from their fields for a quick drink. Few of them, Jake noticed, carried sidearms. About suppertime a tall, gaunt man in a dark suit dismounted and tied a good-looking roan to the rail in the front of the saloon. He wore a holstered pistol and it rested low on his hip. The holster was tied to his leg with a leather string. Almost immediately another rider tied up outside, this one a squat fellow with flaming red hair and a bushy beard. He carried a long parcel wrapped in cowhide. From its size and configuration, Jake could see that it was a long gun, but it was impossible to determine the caliber or manufacturer. Jake moved from the window and stretched out on the bed. Before long the piano in the saloon began its night’s work.
Jake took the holster and pistol from his belt before he left his room, leaving them with the clerk for safekeeping. It was cooler now, although the sun was still sending its harsh light as it approached the western horizon. A fairly stiff breeze was intermittent. Halfway to the saloon Jake crouched as if adjusting his pant leg over his boot and picked up a pinch of dried dirt. He flicked it from his fingers at shoulder height and watched as the grains were whisked away. Then he moved on to the batwing doors.
It took a few moments for Jake’s eyes to adjust to the murky light and haze of tobacco smoke in the saloon and he stood just inside until he could see clearly. The place was interchangeable with every small-town gin mill Jake had ever seen: a long bar behind which was centered the obligatory large seminude painting of a buxom female, breasts bared with a hand coyly covering her groin, a half dozen spittoons spread along the floor in front of the bar, each showing the lack of spitting accuracy of the clientele, oil lamps on hooks throughout the room, damp sawdust, spilled beer, and crushed cigar nubs and cigarette butts on the uneven wooden floor, a few tables with chairs for poker players, and a battered piano at the rear. The saloon smelled of stale beer, cedar sawdust, sweat, and foul breath.
The man who’d left the roa
n at the hitching rail stood at the bar, his rifle resting on the polished wood. A few other men stood about, schooners of beer in their hands, clustered about the rifleman. Jake eased up to the bar. He immediately understood where the name Weasel had come from: The bartender looked like he’d be more at home raiding a chicken coop than pouring beer and booze. His face was narrow and his nose vulpine, more of a snout than a nose, and his eyes were small and dark and suspicious. His body, too, conveyed the weasel image: It was thin and moved quickly but strangely gracefully—almost sinuously.
“Beer,” Jake said, when Weasel nodded at him.
Jake glanced at the rifle on the bar. “Nice weapon,” he said casually. “Not many Spencer 56.46s around these days. Longer reach than the arm of God, right?” He turned away and raised the beer Weasel had put in front of him.
“That’s a fact.” The owner grinned. “Know weapons, do you?” He was tall, probably closer to sixty than to fifty in age, and was dressed in city clothes—white shirt, dark vest, dark pants, and boots. His eyes, Jake noticed, were a pale blue, his gaze unwavering: shooter’s eyes. His hair was mostly gray and pushed back from his face, touching his shoulders.
“I’ve always respected a good rifle like the Spencer and the Sharps.” He added, “My name’s Jake.”
The rifleman nodded. “I’m Will. You shoot, Jake?”
Jake took a long pull at his schooner of icy cold beer. It felt wonderful on his throat and tasted just as good. He wiped foam from his mouth with the back of his hand and smiled. “I’ll tell you this, Will—I’d bet that if you give me two practice rounds with your rifle, I can outshoot you with it at any distance under any conditions. So yeah, it’s fair to say that I shoot.”
Sinclair hadn’t spoken loud, but his words had been heard by the men at and around the bar. An uneasy silence followed. The bystanders watched Will carefully for his reaction, trying to appear that they weren’t doing so.