by Susan Wiggs
She felt her consciousness beginning to fade. Her vision shimmered and danced. In his stern, emotionless voice, Dr. Calhoun had read her name from the train billet: Isabel Fish-Wooten.
The doctor’s hands had been so gentle with her that she’d nearly wept, unaccustomed as she was to compassion. But she’d held in the tears. She’d had so much practice at that. He would have thought her weeping was due to pain, of course, so she didn’t bother. He’d warned her of weakness from blood loss, followed by an opportunistic infection, a potentially fatal fever. She’d taken her chances rather than lie there in his surgery, waiting to be arrested or worse.
Not that she’d done anything wrong, of course, but one of many hard-learned lessons her travels had taught her was that innocence had less validity than the word of a powerful man or the threat of bodily harm.
It occurred to her that she might be dying.
She was too exhausted to be alarmed by the notion, but regrets tiptoed across her consciousness. Not for the life she had lived but for the life she had missed. She did not regret the things she had done. Well, perhaps one or two, but they were minor infractions. No, her regrets were for the things she had failed to do.
She would die never having learned to ride a horse. She’d never held a baby in her arms—not that the notion had any appeal whatsoever, but what woman didn’t think of such things? She had never worn a real diamond ring or kept a friend longer than a few months. She had never seen the islands of the South Pacific or eaten fish roasted on a native fire. She had never heard someone play a ukelele. She’d never kissed a man just for the pure sensual joy of it, she had never got blind, stinking drunk, had never felt the strong, clean power of pure faith. She had never seen a whale, and she had never celebrated her birthday.
She was dying a failure, an incomplete woman. And there was no one to mourn her. She tried to do the mourning herself, but could summon no more than a ragged sigh of discontent. Anything more required too much energy and didn’t seem worth the bother.
Pain and heat weighted her eyes and muffled her hearing. She hurt so much that it really wasn’t like pain at all, but something huge and all-consuming, a mystical force. A burning, pulsing state of grace.
An angel came to see her. She was quite certain it was an angel because when he wrenched open the door, he was surrounded by a nimbus of golden light. He was a heavenly vision, with his abundant wavy hair, broad shoulders, perfect cleft in his chin, narrow hips.
With the last of her strength, she pointed the gun at the angel.
“There you are.” The angel had a wonderful tenor voice and spoke in an educated manner, with proper diction. “I’ve been waiting for you all day.”
I’ll just bet you have. She tried to answer but her throat was dry as ash, her tongue thick and her lips parched.
She took aim, seeing two of him for a moment. Which was the real angel and which was the illusion? Then the images fused into one glittering vision. He was looking off to the side, displaying a flawless profile. It was a shame to have to shoot something so beautiful.
“You knew I would come as soon as I could, Lucas.” This new speaker sounded decidedly feminine, a young woman’s voice brushed with a note of exotic music. She sounded timid and excited all at once.
“Help me put these tools away,” said the angel called Lucas. “What time does your mother expect you home?”
“At seven o’clock.”
She took something from him—a crookneck gardening hoe—and hung it on a peg. “So we have half an hour.”
“Aw, June.” Lucas slammed a shovel into the corner. “Why can’t I just come courting?”
“You know very well why.”
These two were charming, thought Isabel, but her consciousness was fading fast. Her own personal angels. She was amazed they hadn’t noticed her, slumped against a pile of musty burlap sacks, pointing the Derringer at them.
“Tell me,” he said, leaning toward her, capturing her small, fluttering hand. “Tell me why.”
“For one thing, it’s forbidden.” She ducked away, stifling a giggle. “There are laws against intermarriage.”
He laughed. “I don’t want to marry you. I don’t want to marry anyone just yet. I only want—”
She squealed and ducked again, stepping inside the shed, bumping against a wheelbarrow in her haste.
“Besides,” Lucas continued, pursuing her, “I’ll marry whom I please. You should see my grandmother.”
“Is she Chinese, too?”
Don’t come any nearer. Isabel tried to bark the order but something had happened to her voice. It came out a gravelly rasp.
“Almighty Jesus.” Even as he spoke, the boy called Lucas shoved himself in front of the girl.
“Don’t swear.” A shiny head peered around his shoulder.
He thrust her behind him again. “Hush. Be still.”
He gaped at Isabel with a look on his two faces she wished she had never seen. She really needed to shoot him, but which one? No matter how hard she tried, she could not fuse both images into one. Could he see that her head was on fire? Did he know she was dying?
With lightning swiftness, he leaned down and snatched the gun, holding it by the fat little curved barrel. Fool, she thought, squinting at the small Sharp’s double Derringer. Didn’t he know how to handle a gun safely? Apparently not. He shoved it away somewhere.
“Got it,” he said, his voice trembling a little.
The greenhorn. He ought to search the shed for her other weapon. The much more accurate, much more deadly Colt’s pistol. She’d stowed it under a stack of empty burlap sacks.
“Who could it be?” asked June. “What do you suppose we ought to do?”
“Stay back. He could still be armed.” Lucas bent closer. He was no angel but a young, pagan god. He was not simply handsome, but beautiful in a way that, in a few years, would make him a true danger to women.
“He’s hurt or sick or something.” A surprisingly gentle hand brushed at her cheek. “It’s fever.” His fingers brushed something else. “And this gunman is a woman,” he whispered. “Jesus Christ.”
“Don’t swear,” the girl said again.
“Clear out that wheelbarrow. We’ll put her in that.”
A wheelbarrow? Isabel attempted an indignant protest but managed only an aspirated croak. The boy and girl were clumsy but clearly trying to be gentle as they jostled, then lifted her into the creaky wooden receptacle.
“We’re taking her to your father, aren’t we?” said June.
“Yeah.” The muscles in Lucas’s arms corded taut as he lifted the handles of the wheelbarrow. “Maybe for once he’ll think I did something right.”
Five
Blue was only a few minutes late for his meeting with Dr. Vickery, dean of the Regis College of Medicine. After an exhausting day, Blue had managed to steal a nap before leaving for his appointment at the San Francisco Club. He wished he could reschedule and catch up on his sleep, but this meeting was critical. Rory and Blue had chosen Fremont Vickery after careful deliberation.
They needed more medically trained personnel to work at the Rescue League, and Dr. Vickery could provide just that. Presiding over a sizable medical college, he could authorize students to work there as part of their training. Blue hoped he’d be amenable to an agreement.
The moment he stepped into the hushed, understated opulence of the venerable San Francisco Club, Blue felt an unearned sense of privilege. The requirements for membership to the exclusive brotherhood had nothing to do with factors in his control. In order to be admitted to these hallowed halls, one had to be a white gentleman of good family, nominated by a presumably older, wiser white gentleman of similarly good family. The wives met in a salon on the ground floor, taking tea and exchanging gossip, but the second-story parlor was exclusively a man’s domain.
Despite his cynicism about the membership requirements, Blue couldn’t deny the appeal of the place. Simply walking into the walnut-paneled foyer and surrend
ering his hat and umbrella to an attendant gave him the sense that he was entering a different world. A quiet world of gently-aged liqueurs and hand-rolled cigars, of learned conversation and high-minded discourse.
Fremont Vickery was there already, seated in a throne-like wingback chair upholstered in polished leather and studded with round-headed brass tacks. In person, he looked every bit as distinguished as he did in the portrait that hung in the main hall of Regis College. He had abundant silver hair, full sideburns, a close-cropped beard and an air of unimpeachable authority.
He was one of the wealthiest men in the city, no small designation given the concentration of gold rush millionaires, railroad magnates and successful entrepreneurs. The source of his immense wealth was a matter of speculation. Some said his wife, Alma, who suffered from delicate health, had brought him a vast dowry. Others cited his busy private practice and his affiliation with Mercy Heights Hospital. Blue suspected that Regis itself was a gold mine. As a financial enterprise, a medical school tended to be quite rewarding. With the proper funding, any physician could obtain a charter for a school, establish himself and chosen colleagues as the faculty. Student fees provided a healthy source of funds.
But according to Rory, the source of the Vickery millions was his position as the state’s public health officer. His chief duty was to inspect and collect fees from every vessel that entered port, and he was paid well for the service.
Blue guessed that he was paid even better with bribe money from importers eager to avoid scrutiny from the customs service, but that was none of his affair. His business with Vickery had to do with medicine, not commerce.
“Dr. Vickery,” said Blue, shaking hands as the older man rose to greet him, “thank you for meeting with me. Mr. McKnight should be along shortly.” He hid his irritation at Rory, always late, always certain he’d be forgiven.
Vickery motioned for him to take a seat. “It’s a pleasure to see you, Dr. Calhoun.” The genteel drawl of his native Georgia drew out the words.
“So,” said Vickery, “You want my help with your clinic for the indigent.”
The league was more than a charity clinic. It was a place of hope. Women who were alone in the world, who sold their bodies in order to survive, were given a second chance at the waterfront compound, staffed with nuns and other compassionate people from area churches. The office functioned in cooperation with an agency on the fringes of the Barbary Coast district, and through the efforts of the Rescue League, many desperate women found work as domestic help or laborers.
A discreet waiter arrived with a decanter of amber-colored whiskey and filled two crystal glasses. “We need to expand our medical services. I’ve long believed the city’s problems of crime and epidemic are related,” said Blue. “One exacerbates the other.”
“We already have a plan for removing the indigent from the streets. There’s a smallpox isolation ward at Laguna Honda.”
Blue gritted his teeth. He was not talking about removing people from sight, but healing them and pointing the way to a better life. “There’s no facility in the most blighted areas of town,” he pointed out. “The Barbary Coast and Chinatown. The docks are rife with disease, and construction on the new Embarcadero is not even finished. Once it’s in place, the need will be even greater. The sickest people of all aren’t able to drag themselves from their beds, much less enter a hospital miles away.”
Blue could feel Vickery’s attention sharpen, and he was quick to explain himself. “I’m not proposing a rival project or anything of the sort. We simply need more doctors, and I hope to get some by forming an affiliation with a medical school.”
Vickery leaned forward and selected a cigar from the tooled leather humidor on the low table between their chairs. He stroked his long, pale fingers down the length of a fresh cigar. A waiter hurried forward to light it for him. Vickery enjoyed a few puffs before he replied. “But you understand, charities are for churches. We are physicians, my friend, not missionaries.”
“And the people who come to the Rescue League are ill,” countered Blue. “Not heathen.”
Vickery settled back in his chair and crossed his ankle over his knee. A twist of bluish smoke drifted lazily from the tip of his cigar. “You’re an interesting man, Dr. Calhoun. You’ve had an interesting career.”
“If you say so, sir.” Blue decided he had no choice but to let Vickery patronize him.
“You come from one of the best families on the west coast, yet as a youth you joined the Union Army at the height of the war. Why would you do that?”
Blue tried not to look too incredulous. “Sir, I had a duty.”
So Vickery knew more about him than he’d realized. Why? he wondered. Out of a sense of curiosity, competition or both?
“And what was it,” Vickery asked slyly, “luck or guile, that prompted you to marry a Montgomery?”
Blue gripped the arms of his chair to keep himself from taking a swing at him. The Montgomery family was descended from Spanish royalty, and the first Montgomery had taken possession of vast territories along the coast a hundred years earlier. Their collective wealth rivaled that of a small European nation.
“It was neither, sir,” Blue said, though he knew Vickery would never believe him. “Sancha and I were childhood sweethearts, and our marriage was a love match.”
“I see. You’ll forgive me for asking, but why, after setting up one of the most prosperous practices in the city, did you abandon it and rejoin the army?”
“The army needed doctors at the frontier. Just because there wasn’t a war on didn’t mean people were not getting sick—or killed.” Yet if Blue had known what that tour of duty was going to cost him, he would have stayed in San Francisco, treating cases of the gout and ladies’ vapors and pretending it fulfilled him.
“You were widowed while serving in the army, were you not?” inquired Vickery.
Even now, a decade later, the old rage and grief gouged at him. His loss. His failure. “My wife was killed while we were posted at Fort Carrington, Wyoming.”
“I’m very sorry. The loss of one’s wife is a blow from which a man never recovers. If I lost my Alma, I’d be done for,” Vickery said. “Was it an accident?”
Of course it wasn’t an accident. But Blue saw no point in trying to explain the inexplicable. Attempting to place the blame where it belonged had landed him in enough trouble years ago. “Look, I understand you have questions about my departure from the military.”
“I like to know who I’m dealing with.”
“I was cashiered and sent home in dishonor. Does that factor into your decision about the Rescue League?”
“That depends. Does it factor into your performance and commitment to your vocation?”
Blue didn’t answer. The past didn’t simply melt away like the winter snow on the slopes of the mountains. Although invisible to the eye, the past resided in a man’s heart, a dark, slow poison with no antidote.
Still…that could not stop him from trying to improve life for others. With a slight shake of his head, he declined the offer of a cigar. “Not in the least. My hope is that you’ll lend your support to our present enterprise on its own merits, not my reputation,” he said. “It’s an opportunity to improve the public health, and to train medical students in the field.”
Rory McKnight finally joined them, fashionably late and fashionably dressed as always. He made no effort to hide his delight at being in the company of one of most prominent men in the city. He took full advantage of the whiskey and cigars, but quickly got down to business, handing Vickery a folio of papers related to the proposal.
“You’ve come up with an admirable and detailed plan,” Vickery said, flipping through the pages. “I shall read this carefully and give it due consideration.”
“Dr. Vickery,” Blue said, “I’m not looking for consideration, but approval, as quickly as possible.”
“That’s not possible.”
“Why not?”
“You can’t simpl
y dive headlong into the underworld and rescue people from ailments of their own making.”
“That’s precisely what we’ve been doing since the Mission Rescue League was founded.” Blue exchanged a glance with Rory. They were both thinking the same thing. Vickery was going to reject the idea. “Sir,” he said, “we’re proposing to improve the general health of the city. Isn’t making San Francisco a better place good for us all?”
“Of course. But you understand, the presence of a medical facility in the vicinity will mean nothing but trouble.”
“I believe Dr. Vickery is concerned that a licensed physician is bound to be the target of addicts seeking morphine and ether,” Rory said, interceding before Blue lost his temper. “And unfortunately, he might be right.”
“This happens to me constantly, whether I’m working at my private surgery or at the Rescue League,” Blue admitted, thinking of the hissing wrecks who frequently approached him, demanding opium. Their persistence was matched only by that of his well-heeled patients, pleading for laudanum or paregoric. “I’m certain you encounter that as well, Dr. Vickery.”
He hesitated. “Such blights of humanity are a fact of a doctor’s life.” When he leaned back and re-lit his cigar, Blue noticed two things about him. Vickery had a slight tremor in his hands. And the skin of his right hand was scraped raw, like a bare-knuckle boxer’s.
“Sir, we’d like your answer as soon as possible,” Blue said, trying to bring the conversation back to the original topic. “The practical experience for your students would be invaluable, and the service to the neediest of the city immeasurable.”
“I know that.” He patted the folio Rory had presented. “I intend to give this my approval, and I’ll announce the opportunity to my advanced students first thing in the morning.”
Blue was stunned, but didn’t want to say anything, in case he’d heard wrong.
“To the public health, then,” Rory declared, lifting his glass and draining it. Unlike Blue, he seemed unsurprised by the ease with which they’d achieved their purpose. Steepling his fingers and resting his elbows on his knees, Rory leaned forward to inquire, “How did you get so blessed rich, Dr. Vickery?”