Coming Home for Christmas

by Carla Kelly

  She couldn’t see him as he stood in the shadows by his quarters off the hospital, so he watched her, touched by her air of calm, when he suspected she was feeling anything but. After a moment, she raised her eyes from their contemplation of the tile and dabbed at them with a lace handkerchief that looked like one of the items he had bought back for her at yesterday’s auction.

  Her quiet beauty took his breath away, as he wondered just when, in the past years of knowing her, she had turned into such a lovely lady. While it was true she was much slimmer than Cora McClean, his faithless fiancée, she had a figure that was beginning to make him warm under his shirt.

  She stood alone, without a friend in sight. He watched as she looked heavenward, as though seeking aid. Seeing none, she sighed—he couldn’t hear her, but her breast rose and fell eloquently. Then she squared her shoulders and straightened her back, as if preparing herself for another ordeal: the ordeal of marriage to a stranded surgeon in the Royal Navy, because not one of her own would take her in.

  “I won’t be so bad,” Thomas whispered. “I promise you, lass.”

  If Ralph Gooding hadn’t insisted on being carried across the courtyard on a stretcher, there would have been no guests at their wedding. The effort made Gooding’s fevered cheeks even brighter. When Thomas rose and took a step toward him, the carpenter shook his head.

  “As you were, laddie,” he managed to say, with a touch of his humor that even consumption couldn’t steal away.

  Thomas nodded and resumed his place at the altar on his knees beside his bride. He had brushed his uniform into submission, but he had lost weight and now it hung on him. Lately, he had been going about in Spanish trousers and linen shirts, and the worn blue wool felt almost alien. Laura had changed into another dress, one not so wrinkled and smelling of the dungeon, but plain and dark green with a crocheted collar. She had coiled her pretty hair around her head like a coronet. He wondered how long it actually was and grew a little warm, thinking that he might actually find out in a few hours. Her black-lace mantilla hid her hair, but not her face, and certainly not her frightened eyes.

  He had a ring, a little silver bauble given in payment several years ago by a fisherman after he extracted a hook from the man’s lip. Thomas was too cynical to believe the man’s tale of treasure from a Spanish galleon of the Philippines trade, but it was a pretty ring so he had kept it, rather than bartering it for something else.

  This was the ring he slid on Laura’s finger, surprising them both because it fit. For the only time in the ceremony, she looked him in the eye and smiled slightly, before dropping her gaze to the tile floor again.

  The service was in Latin, of course, and Thomas had no idea what Father Hilario was saying. He supposed it was something about loving, honoring and obeying. He imagined his ancestors looking down on the two of them with Presbyterian disapproval, but it bothered him less than he would have thought. They were dead and he was not, and they had probably known as much as he did about the general uncertainty of life.

  He knew, by marrying Laura Ortiz, that he was doing a kind thing. Whether it was a wise thing remained to be seen. Still, the whole matter had quite wiped away his disgruntlement at the sailing of the Almost Splendid without him. He had more pressing concerns now.

  Ralph Gooding had taxed himself sore by attending the wedding, and then signing the wedding book as one of two witnesses—the other was the sexton. With a smile at his new bride and a nod to Father Hilario, Thomas had seen to his patient’s return to his bed, and then sat with him for part of the afternoon as the man coughed and hemorrhaged. Ralph slept finally, exhausted, and Thomas had nowhere to go except his quarters, located off the ward. He hoped Laura would be there.

  She was, just sitting in that still way of hers, hands clasped on her table this time. He looked around appreciatively. Laura had removed a colorful tablecloth from her trunk of possessions that he had purchased at the auction and spread it on the table. He had made a settee of sorts out of a discarded packing case. She had found two embroidered pillows and placed them on his makeshift sofa. A saint now looked at him benevolently from a small alcove, which had probably been waiting for such an occupant a few years, rather than the tin cup and grog bottle he usually kept there.

  “Who’s she?” he asked his new wife.

  “St Cecilia,” Laura replied. The sudden bloom in her cheeks gave him ample proof that she was just as frightened and shy as he was. “She is the patron saint of music.” She swallowed, and he knew what an effort she was making. “My mother’s name was Cecilia.” She looked at him then, and, with a pang, he wondered where the confident, imperious Laura had gone. “I thought I had lost her, but you bought so many of my things. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome,” he replied, touched. “May…may I sit down?”

  There was just the hint of her former spark. “Of course you may! This is your house.”

  He sat down opposite her, feeling suddenly large and clumsy and red-faced, so unlike the people she was used to. He wanted to assure her that he was a kind man who would never hurt or frighten her, but a sudden pounding on the door took him out of his quarters. A garrison bull had gored one of the soldiers and he was needed at once.

  A goring, what a relief, he thought.

  Without a word, he picked up his remedy bag and slung it over his shoulder. Laura was standing by the table now, her eyes full of concern. “Is there anything I can do?” she asked.

  “You’re a dear to ask,” he said in English. “Yes, there is,” he said in Spanish. “I don’t know how long I will be. The garrison cook always delivers dinner to my quarters and food for Señor Gooding. Will you see that he is fed?”

  She nodded, her expressive eyes filled with purpose now. “Will he eat much?”

  “I doubt it. He had a bad spell this afternoon. If he does not want to eat, just sit with him, will you?”

  Laura nodded again. He couldn’t help himself. He reached out and touched her arm. “Don’t be afraid if he starts to hemorrhage. Just raise up his head and keep his mouth clear. Will you do that? I am asking a lot.”

  “No, you are not,” she replied. She hesitated. “And may I eat, too? It has been a long day.”

  “Laura, everything I have is yours now,” he said simply. “Even the beans and tortillas.”

  He smiled to show it was a joke, but she was looking at him in that serious way he was more familiar with. “Of course you may eat. Just save me something and put it in that cupboard.”

  She nodded. Her cheeks blossomed with pink again. “Should I wait up for you?”

  “No. Just go to bed, Laura. I’ll be quiet when I come in.”

  She took a deep breath. “In which bed?”

  “Yours, of course. We need to talk…first.”

  The tears in her eyes surprised him. He didn’t have time to think about it, not with something as interesting as a goring waiting for him in the stable, a problem he might actually be able to solve. Wives were probably different, especially a wife on such short notice. Did she think he didn’t want her? Was she relieved? Nervous?

  Thomas Wilkie prided himself on being a man of science. Too bad he had no idea what to do next.

  Chapter Six

  Thomas knew the goring should have fascinated him, considering that it was something he could never have hoped to treat at sea, but all he wanted to do was return to his quarters. He rendered the best care he was capable of, all the time thinking about the length of Laura’s hair and how lovely it must look spread on a pillow.

  Calm down, Wilkie, he warned himself. You just told her you weren’t going to bother her and you’re not.

  He wavered for a moment between leaving the unconscious but stable soldier where he was, or taking him to the little ward off his quarters, where he could observe him more closely throughout the night. His training won out.

  It was a small ward and, thankfully, a healthy garrison; the only other patient right now was Ralph Gooding, who slept. Working quickly a
nd quietly, Thomas settled his new patient into a bed and stood over him for a long moment, taking the time—he always did it—to second-guess himself, play devil’s advocate and assure himself that he had done all he could for the moment. When he was satisfied, he let himself out of the room quietly and went a few steps to his own quarters, which could be entered from the ward as well as from the outside door leading to the fort’s plaza.

  He smiled to see a candle burning on Laura’s table, thinking she had lit it for him. He remembered the many times his mother had done just that for his father, out late on a call. Maeve Wilkie had generally left a small snack by the candle. He looked closer, touched to see that Laura had left him a tortilla. She must have found some butter somewhere, because she had spread it on the tortilla and then sprinkled a little cinnamon and sugar on it.

  He sat down quietly and ate, pleased at her concern and a little surprised by it. Maybe wives of surgeons had a sixth sense about what to do. He would have to ask his mother some day, if he ever saw her again.

  Thomas looked toward the door to his bedroom, a little amazed that he was already thinking of Laura Ortiz—Wilkie now—as his wife. He shook his head, still wondering why he had bought so many of her personal effects at that auction. I must be the softest touch in all of Alta California, he thought.

  Taking off his shoes, he tiptoed to the closed door and opened it, hesitant to go in. He reminded himself that it was his bedroom and moved with more assurance. He left the door open; from the little lamplight from the other room, he saw Laura asleep in her bed. She had gathered herself into a ball; perhaps she was chilly.

  He looked closer at her, saddened to see the tears that had dried on her cheek. What a day for you, he told himself, in complete sympathy. You bid adiós to your father, not knowing if you will see him again, and find yourself in a strange new situation, one not of your own choosing. “Believe me, I can understand,” he said under his breath, thinking of his four years in San Diego, a lovely sun-kissed paradise for seamen that he would happily trade for one glimpse of chilly, foggy Dumfries.

  He was only going to find his Mexican sandals, one of the numerous pleasant side effects of life in California, and return to the ward. He found the sandals, but stood for another long moment looking at Laura, admiring the length of her eyelashes and still surprised by her beauty, which he had never really noticed before the last few days. He was oddly touched by the way that, in sleep, her thumb rested under her curved fingers, rather like a baby at rest.

  I don’t even know you and you are my wife, he thought. He decided that stranger things than this had probably happened in the whole history of the world. Before he left the room, he took his extra blanket from his bed and draped it gently over her. Laura stirred in her sleep and murmured something, then returned to slumber, if she had ever left it. He closed the door quietly behind him.

  As nights went, it didn’t seem so long. Thomas had spent many such nights at bedsides and by hammocks, on all seven seas. He made himself comfortable on the sling-back canvas chair he had rescued from the old Splendid, before it was broken up for firewood. He positioned his slat-sided lamp just so and shook out the fort’s sporadically published broadside, pleased that he could read in Spanish as easily as in English now.

  The soldier—his name was Juan—woke up halfway through the night, just when Thomas was starting to doze. He groaned, and Thomas was awake in an instant, checking the drain he had put into the young man’s groin, then feeling his forehead for a fever that might signal infection. Blessedly, he was still cool. Thomas sprinkled a frugal amount of opium in a glass and raised the man slightly to drink it. In moments he was asleep again.

  Thomas settled in his chair again. He heard Ralph stirring and turned his chair around. “Have you been awake long?” he whispered.

  His other patient shook his head. Thomas put his hand on Ralph’s forehead, sighing to feel the heat there and knowing there was little he could do to change the matter. After the past year, he had to wonder what the carpenter was using for lungs now. Not even the beguiling climate could trump the ravages of consumption.

  “What say you, Surgeon Wilkie?” Ralph whispered. “Will I make Christmas this year? Be honest now.”

  “I don’t know,” Thomas replied.

  He knew his patient well. Ralph only smiled and settled himself more comfortably, not a man to complain. “Well, at least I saw you married to a lovely lady,” he whispered. “Maybe San Diego will turn into the best thing that ever happened to you.”

  “Hardly,” Thomas replied. “I can’t imagine what I was thinking.”

  Ralph chuckled. “Oh, you can’t? Sir—”

  “Just Thomas,” the surgeon reminded him.

  “Thomas, you know as well as I do that she’s pretty enough to raise the dead.”

  Thomas was silent. He felt his face going red in the gloom of the ward. “Go to sleep, you rascal,” he said finally and turned his chair around again.

  “All it takes is time,” Ralph told him, “something you have a lot of.”

  Thomas sighed again, but more quietly. And something you have so little of, he thought.

  The ward was silent then. Thomas relaxed when he heard Ralph’s steady breathing, even though it was more labored with each passing day. Will you make Christmas, my friend? he asked himself. I sincerely doubt it.

  The rest of the night passed more slowly. The soldier woke again, in pain and trying to tug loose the drain. Thomas stayed his arm and then stroked it, speaking quietly to him, until he returned to restless slumber. When the man finally relaxed just before dawn and slept, Thomas slept too, his bare feet propped up on his patient’s cot.

  He woke hours later. The room was light now and he heard birds singing in the jacaranda tree in the courtyard. The presidio was rousing itself for another beautiful day. Thomas glanced at the soldier, who still slept, then looked down in surprise.

  At some point in the early morning hours, Laura must have covered him with the extra blanket he had spread over her. What a sweet lassie you are, he thought, as he carefully pulled back the blanket and got out of his chair, stretching. Laura must have extinguished the bedside lantern, too, which made him smile and think of his own frugal Scots mother.

  Walking to the door that opened onto the courtyard, he stood a long moment in thought, watching the soldiers assemble—most of them lived with their women in the nearby pueblo. In the past year he had doctored many of their families. They generally paid him in tortillas and tamales, and the occasional hen past her laying prime. The families of the officials were more generous because they had more, which meant the occasional blanket—or even a pearl from Panama, paid after he had successfully bored into the skull of a small boy with swelling on the brain after a fall from his father’s horse.

  He looked at the door to his own quarters, still shut, wondering if Laura would have the courage to face her own kind again, since they had turned so relentlessly against her father and her. He knew there was a way to make it happen, but it would certainly test her mettle.

  The first test was coming; he could see it walking across the courtyard right now, heavily laden with breakfast. He stepped aside, nodding his usual greeting to the kitchen hand who brought his morning meal of tortillas and mush.

  “Hola, Pablo,” he said, raising his hand in a friendly greeting. “Como estás?”

  The man smiled his own greeting. Thomas gestured to the table beside the closed door and he set down the tray of food, hot and fragrant from the presidio’s mess hall. He gestured again to the stool and the kitchen hand sat.

  “Pablo, I have a problem that only you can help me with,” the surgeon said, after the pleasantries that his Scottish upbringing had learned to offer to these people who seemed to naturally have more free time than his own kind.

  “Anything for you, señor,” Pablo replied. He touched his own arm. “After all, think of what you did when I burned my arm.”

  “Ah, yes, I did help you, didn’t I?” Th
omas smiled. “That is what I am trained to do.”

  “Of course, señor, but not even our own garrison doctor—” he crossed himself “—rest his memory, could be bothered with kitchen workers.”

  “Perhaps he was too busy,” Thomas replied diplomatically. “I know how that can happen.”

  “Perhaps,” the man agreed, but he sounded doubtful. “Señor, your food will get cold.”

  Thomas nodded. He leaned forward, so Pablo leaned forward, too. “Pablo, yesterday morning I married Doña Laura Ortiz de la Garza.”

  Pablo nodded, his eyes troubled. “She is the daughter of a very bad man. Begging your pardon, but you should not have done that.”

  “She is not a bad person, Pablo. Far from it. I find her most pleasing and charming.” Well, I do, he thought to himself, even if she thinks I am a low-class barbarian. “She feels sad because no one will speak to her now.”

  “Why should we?” Pablo said with a shrug.

  “Because she is my wife, Pablo,” Thomas said gently, feeling a pang in his heart for the woman he had so precipitately married. “I have been a friend to you and many others in this garrison. It would pain me to see her treated unkindly. Especially after I have been so kind to you,” he added, with a sorrowful shake of his head. “It’s just a thought, Pablo. Here, let me open the door for you.”

  Thomas swung the door wide. Laura stood there, her hands tight together. He didn’t think she had heard any of their conversation through the heavy door, but there was no overlooking the dread in her eyes when she came face-to-face with a member—albeit a lowly one—of the garrison her father had cheated.

  There they stood. Thomas gestured to the table. “Thank you, Pablo, for the breakfast. And this is Señora Wilkie.”

  It could have gone either way; Thomas knew that. All Pablo had to do was nod to him and turn on his heel. He did not. To the surgeon’s relief, the kitchen hand—lowest of the low in the garrison and destined always to remain such—beamed at them both.