Sawbones

by Melissa Lenhardt

  “Yes, before I came west. My mother forced me to see her doctor. She is concerned at my failure.” Her words were laced with bitterness.

  “What did the doctor say?” I asked, sure of the answer.

  “He told me to submit to my husband always, daily if needed.”

  I nodded. “Did he examine you?”

  “No. He barely looked at me and left as soon as possible, as if I was too ugly to be around for a moment longer than necessary. There are some things even my father’s money cannot buy.”

  “You’re not ugly, Alice.”

  The cynicism laced in her words came out as a laugh. “You are a poor liar, Dr. Elliston.”

  When I thought of the lies I told since I left New York it was my turn to laugh. “I’m glad you think so.” I realized when I uttered it that the comment was inappropriate and offensive to Alice. I rubbed my aching shoulder. “How often do you have relations?”

  She was much prettier when she blushed. “Whenever Wallace requests. Which isn’t as often as it was before.”

  “I’m sure it’s difficult with your husband on patrol so often.”

  “Yes, but…”

  “He’s less interested?”

  She nodded.

  “I am sure his duties…”

  “Please don’t make excuses for him. I know why he is not turning to me. So do you.”

  I stopped rubbing my shoulder. I remembered Alice’s tortured expression in the hospital, which I assumed was from the death of Private Howerton. “How much of my conversation with Ruth did you hear?”

  “I went to tell you of Private Howerton.” She looked up from the floor. “He despises being called Wally.”

  “There is no guarantee the child is your husband’s.”

  “She said herself she is not a whore. Wallace would never do that.”

  I held my tongue. Alice didn’t hear much or she would have known Ruth was, indeed, a whore, only an unpaid whore for Wallace Strong.

  Alice continued. “Wallace liked my sister better than me. She was too young to marry, only fifteen. My parents told him I had to be married before Constance. He wanted his commission enough he agreed.” Her smile was bitter, knowing. “So you see, I know Wallace prefers young, pretty girls. Constance is much prettier than I. Stupid, but pretty.”

  “Alice, I wish you would stop inferring you are not attractive.”

  “I didn’t come here to be pandered to, Dr. Elliston. I want to know what I can do to please my husband, to provide him with a legitimate heir.”

  “What makes you think my advice will be different from the other doctor’s?”

  “Because you are a woman, a doctor, and a widow.”

  Damn you, Harriet Mackenzie, I thought. This girl came to me based on a lie. I had no advice to give her on how to interest her husband. She could not compete with her rival in appearance. Though Ruth was ignorant and poor, she had a natural beauty and energy Alice lacked. If outward appearance was the primary attraction for men, however, whorehouses would not be brimming over with successful ugly women. Most men didn’t care how a woman looked as long as she was willing, or pretended to be.

  “I hope I don’t shock you with this question but I will remind you, you brought the subject up.”

  “Go on.”

  “Do you enjoy laying with your husband?”

  “Enjoy it?” she asked, almost laughing. “How could anyone enjoy it? Did you?”

  I almost told Alice the truth, about my brief affair with James, one borne of curiosity, affection, and familiarity rather than love. But, suddenly, I cared what this woman thought of me. Instead, I sprinkled a bit of my truth in with a healthy dose of lies. “I only lay with my husband the one night, my wedding night. He left for the war the next day and didn’t return.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. He was sweet but a bit methodical, as if he was following an instruction manual in his head. There was little passion and it hurt.”

  Alice nodded. “It stops hurting after a while, but it has never been comfortable.”

  “I tell you about my experience so you know the advice I am about to give you doesn’t come from me, rather it comes from patients I have had over the years.”

  She was wary, but I suspect she knew the answer before she asked. “What type of patients?”

  “Prostitutes.”

  She hid her horror and disgust well, proving she was truly desperate, as well as deeply in love with her husband. “Go on.”

  “While I am sure there are women who enjoy relations—I refuse to believe God would create such an act purely for the pleasure of one sex—all prostitutes make their partners believe they do. Men are vain and I suspect your husband is vainer than most. If he thinks being with him is what you want, not something you endure, he might be more ardent.”

  I worried she would take my jab at Lieutenant Strong as an insult, but she did not. “Pretend to enjoy it,” she said, thoughtfully.

  I shrugged. “It is the best advice I have to get him back in your bed, regularly. Who knows, if you act like you enjoy it enough, maybe you will.”

  Alice looked skeptical. “There is one other option.”

  “Yes?”

  I narrowed my eyes and wondered how she would react to this piece of advice.

  “Please, Dr. Elliston.”

  I sighed. “When it becomes too painful, the women use oil.”

  Alice looked more perplexed and I felt my face flush with embarrassment.

  “To lubricate.”

  “Oh.”

  “Vegetable oil,” I said. “Not much, of course.”

  Alice wrinkled her nose. “Vegetable oil?”

  “They said the men enjoyed it, too.”

  She stood from the bed and retrieved her reticule. “Thank you, Dr. Elliston.”

  “I don’t know how much help I have been.”

  There was a knock on the door followed by the voice of the hotel clerk telling me there was a man in the lobby dripping blood from a knife wound.

  “I wouldn’t put it past Edna Carter to have cut the man herself. I’m flattered by her determination to have me stay.”

  “I wish you would. Even if your advice does not help, it was enough to have someone to talk to.” She reached into her reticule and removed a silver piece to give me.

  “No, keep it,” I said. “I fear it is worth much more than my advice.”

  * * *

  The man entered the room, holding a dirty scrap of cloth over his left forearm. As with every male patient, Sergeant Washington made a point of keeping the door open and being visible through it.

  “Doc,” the man said. His hair was flattened with oil and his forehead was white from wearing a hat and his cheeks pale from being recently protected by a beard.

  “A bar fight?” I asked, examining the short, deep gash.

  “Of a kind.”

  I held his arm closer to the lamp. “You’ll need stitches, I am afraid. This may hurt,” I said. I pulled the open skin apart to see if the cut went to the bone. The man never flinched nor caught his breath like many would have. Curious about this stoic character, I looked him full in the face for the first time and was startled to catch him staring at me with narrowed, penetrating eyes. In a blink, his expression was clear and friendly. He might have once been handsome but years of exposure and hard living were lined on his face.

  “Would you like some laudanum to help with the pain?”

  “No.”

  I poured whisky into a basin and dropped my instruments in it.

  “What a waste of good whisky.”

  “Ah, but this is not good whisky. I save that for drinking.”

  “You like whisky?”

  I threaded a needle. “I have had it before. I can’t say I like it. Would you like some?”

  “Depends on if you’re serving the good stuff.”

  “If you’re paying I’ll serve you whatever you want.”

  He reached into his waistcoat pocket
and removed two gold dollars.

  I pulled a bottle of whisky a patient had given me earlier in the day and gave him a glass. He drank it in one gulp.

  I sewed his arm. “Are you a farmer near here?”

  “Not a very successful one.” The man took a deep, steadying breath.

  “Am I hurting you?”

  “No. How long have you been in town? I don’t remember hearing about you last time I was here.”

  “Two weeks, though it seems much longer.”

  “Don’t like it here?”

  I thought of Kindle. “It has a few good qualities. Nothing to keep me here, though.”

  “It’s a harsh life for a woman, and that’s a fact.”

  “I’ve found unless you’re wealthy, life is harsh for women no matter where you are.”

  The man chuckled and nodded. “I suppose so.”

  “Mostly, I want to leave because I miss trees,” I said, laughing.

  “Well, there aren’t many of those out here. It’s too bad for Jacksboro you don’t want to stay. You’re doin’ a right nice job on my arm.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I bet I don’t even have a scar later.”

  “If you follow my instructions, you might not. Or only a small one.”

  “I thought women liked scars on men.”

  “I suppose some do.” I tied off the last stitch and applied carbolic acid plaster on the wound and bound it with a clean bandage.

  “Do you?” he asked.

  “In about a week, remove the stitches. Be sure to use a clean knife or scissors.”

  He stood to leave. “Won’t you do it for me?”

  “No. I leave town tomorrow.” I washed and dried my hands.

  “Do you? Well, be careful out there on the trail. Watch out for Injuns.”

  I ignored the comment. “Try your best to keep it clean and change the bandages regularly.” I turned to give him a clean bandage to take with him, but he was gone.

  * * *

  The differences between my conversation with Alice and Ruth could not have been starker. It beggared belief Wallace Strong would prefer an ignorant dreamer like Ruth to a strong, intelligent woman like Alice. My dawning appreciation of Alice made my patience with Ruth during our parting conversation very thin.

  With Ruth’s diet, occupation, and an unsympathetic mother, I feared for the future of Ruth and her unborn child.

  “You must promise me to see Dr. Kline. He will help you any way he can.”

  “I don’t need no doctor to birth my baby.”

  “I’m not talking of the birth. If you need assistance before your term, go to Dr. Kline.”

  Ruth’s eyes were wide with excitement. “I don’t think Mama will notice. I ain’t big and if I do get a little big she’ll think I’m getting fat. She always says I’m too skinny. She’ll be glad.”

  “What of your job? You cannot be entertaining men while pregnant. It is not good for the baby and surely they will notice.”

  “Some men pay extra for it.”

  “That is disgusting, Ruth. Let us go to your mother together, before I leave.”

  Ruth was emphatic. “No. She’ll either sell me more because of the baby or she’ll kill it.”

  Maybe I should stay, I thought. I could be the buffer between mother and daughter when Mary found out, which she was bound to do. She was not stupid, nor were the other women. Someone would notice Ruth’s condition.

  She stood before me as straight and unmovable as a marble column. If she did not inherit her mother’s coloring, she did her determination. Maybe she could stand up to her mother without my help.

  “I want you to swear to me, on the Bible, if anything goes wrong you’ll go see Dr. Kline.”

  “I can’t swear on the Bible!”

  I sighed in exasperation. She would lay with multiple men out of wedlock but she would not swear on the Bible. It always amazed me where people drew their moral line in the sand.

  “Promise me.”

  She knew she had won. She grinned. “I promise.”

  I didn’t believe her. Nor did Ezra when I relayed the story to him. “You cannot save everyone, Catherine.”

  “Should saving everyone not be our goal?”

  “Yes, but you cannot dwell on the ones you cannot. Move on to the ones you can.”

  He watched as I replenished my medicine case with the stores from the dispensary. “Are you sure Foster approved this?”

  “Yes,” Ezra said.

  “I don’t believe you.” I continued to stock my case.

  “Have you become so adept at lying you can spot a liar as well?”

  “I’m not as adept as you think. Kindle and Alice Strong can see right through me. Has Foster said anything about the letter?” I asked.

  “No.”

  “Hmm. I hope Foster isn’t giving me this medicine in lieu of Sherman’s recommendation,” I said. I looked at Ezra. “I may be self-centered and an accomplished liar but I am not, nor have I ever been, a hypocrite.” I held up a bottle of carbolic acid. “I wish you had more. I cannot take your last bottle. I’ll get more at Sill, or in Denver.” I put it back on the shelf. “You forget I have been forced to be dishonest.”

  “I haven’t forgotten.”

  “I have lied about two things, my name and being a war widow. The latter was Harriet Mackenzie’s lie I went along with to keep the peace.”

  “Surprising when you consider confrontation rather than peacekeeping is your nature.”

  I ignored the insult. I wrinkled my nose. “I lied to Pope, as well. I forgot about him. Besides those fibs, I have told portions of my real history where I can and done my best to avoid revealing too much or creating more elaborate lies.” Finished restocking, I closed my trunk and turned to Ezra. “What would you have me do? Return to New York?”

  “Tell Captain Kindle.”

  “Why? What good would it do?”

  “He could help you.”

  “No, he couldn’t. Besides, he knows.”

  “All of it?”

  “Only that I’m running from something.”

  “Why did you tell him that if not all?”

  I sighed. “It is a long story, Ezra. Tomorrow we will say good-bye and never see each other again. What if Beatrice Langton has Pinkertons following me? I don’t want to take the chance my real story might get out. The frontier is not as large as I hoped.”

  Ezra followed me out of the dispensary and into the office. The trunk containing my personal belongings was open in the corner. He sat in his desk chair and folded his hands over his stomach. “I sense you and the captain are searching for something to keep you here.”

  “There is nothing to keep me here.”

  “Even me?”

  I pretended to rearrange items in my trunk and closed it. “I was hoping you wouldn’t ask.” I sat on the trunk and faced Ezra. “You are the only person I would stay for.”

  “That’s a lie.”

  I shook my head and looked down. “He would ask me to give up medicine. I cannot love a man who would ask that of me.”

  “From what I have observed, you already do.”

  I scoffed. “It’s ridiculous. I haven’t known him a month.”

  “I fell in love with Dorothy before I said a word to her.”

  “That’s different. Can we please talk of something else?”

  “Closing yourself off from people who care about you and whom you care about will not keep you from getting hurt.”

  No, but it will keep me from hurting them, I thought. Maureen’s mutilated face floated in front of my eyes.

  I leaned forward and grasped his hands. “Let us say good-bye tonight. I don’t want to cry in front of the fort in the morning.”

  He cradled my cheek in his hand. “Little Katie Bennett. Pretty as the day you were born.”

  My laughter was choked with a sob. “You always said I was an ugly baby.”

  “Someone had to make sure you were not the vainest woman al
ive. Your father was not up to the task. Nor were Dorothy and James.”

  I clutched the hand on my cheek and kissed it. “I always knew you loved me best.” I gave his hands one last squeeze and stood. “Do not forget your promise about Ruth.”

  He nodded. “Good night, Katie.”

  I leaned forward, kissed his bald forehead, and whispered, “Good-bye.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  It was hours before dawn and I could not sleep. The hospital was quiet except for the occasional cough of a patient downstairs and the whistling of wind through my open window. Despite this, the smell of death permeated my room. The memory of my last night in New York drove me out of bed. I rose, wrapped my shawl around my shoulders, and picked up The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. I decided spending the night sitting alone in the reading room, finishing the novel was preferable to being sleepless in a recently abandoned death room.

  The wind was heavy with the smell of rain. Lightning flashed in the distance, followed by the low rumble of thunder. I hurried across the darkened, deserted parade ground. I closed the door to the reading room as the skies opened.

  I leaned against the door and caught my breath. It was a small, square room, though two windows on each wall gave the space an unexpectedly airy impression. All available wall space was taken up by floor-to-ceiling shelves overflowing with books. Large and small desks were lined up in the middle of the room and faced a rolling chalkboard. A small desk for a teacher sat in one corner. A large paddle with holes drilled in the blade hung on a nail next to the desk.

  When my eyes adjusted to the dark I crept to the teacher’s desk in the corner. I fumbled for matches and lit the oil lamp on the desk. I replaced the glass, increased the wick, and sat. I was settling into the novel’s denouement when I heard a step on the porch. I instinctively turned the lamp down and held my breath. I dared not imagine who might be on the other side of the door. A whisky-soaked enlisted man most like. Or possibly Harriet come to make sure I wasn’t enjoying myself too much. I thought of my gun, packed away in my trunk.

  Kindle poked his head through the door. “Laura?”

  I sighed in relief and turned up the lamp. “I’m here.”

  He closed the door behind him. “What are you doing here?”

  “I am reading in the reading room. Whatever will I do next?”