That Certain Spark

by Cathy Marie Hake

  There were times those few words left him feeling convicted, and he’d eat in silence. The doctor never bothered to make conversation in those instances. Likely, she had plenty on her mind. On other occasions, her prayers lifted his spirits and he’d think to tease her or talk about goings on in the town. This afternoon was one such time. “This casserole—it’s good. We’ll eat it all and hide the crock.”

  “Piet might have something to say about that when he sees those noodles sticking to your shirt.”

  Karl chortled. He knew full well Doc wouldn’t allow him to eat all of the food. She was like that—always making sure to save part of whatever she was given to share with him when he drove her somewhere. Times when she went out alone someplace close by, she’d still come back to the livery and not have so much as sampled the food. Piet and he kept silverware and plates clean all of the time now—something they’d never bothered with before. “You’d better have more. The minute Piet sees you with this, it’ll be a miracle if he helps you out of the buggy before he swipes it from you.”

  “I believe in miracles.”

  Karl squinted into the distance. “You’re a doctor. You should believe in science.”

  “God created the laws of science that regulate the physical world in which we live.” Her voice grew pensive. “But I don’t ever want to limit the Lord to finite rules. He’s the God of infinite possibilities, so even as a physician I believe in miracles.”

  “You didn’t have to explain all of that.”

  “I didn’t?”

  He wished he hadn’t backed himself into this conversation. It was sinking into depths he didn’t want to plumb. Karl grasped for the easiest excuse. “You have to believe in miracles if you think I’ll have left any of this food in the dish by the time we get back to town.”

  Taylor laughed. She was like that—she’d look at him for a split second, and in that half-blink of time, she’d detect some of the uncertainty he felt, the nagging doubts. She gave him that breath of time to decide how he wanted to handle things—if he’d like to talk about the matter, or sleep, or ignore it altogether and skip to a different subject. Most women weren’t like that—at least none of the other women he’d ever known.

  But Taylor MacLay Bestman was a woman unto herself.

  She laughed and let him off the hook, diffusing what could have been an awkward, Bible-thumping moment. “You and Piet are fortunate Enoch’s gotten married. Now you won’t have to fight him for the food.”

  “It puzzled me that you didn’t go eat with him and Mercy while they were courting. He’s your family. Surely you’ll do so now.”

  “Sometimes. My brother is so head-over-heels in love with Mercy and Heidi that he doesn’t even notice having the big ‘family’ of boarders around the table every morning and night. Suddenly, if it were just Mercy, Heidi, and my brother, Heidi might feel like she’s missing something. I enjoy going over now and then, but I’m just as glad it’s not for every meal.”

  One more look at the crock, and Karl gripped his fork. “I’m glad, too!”

  Back in town, Taylor handed the food to Piet with great pomp. Piet fell upon it ravenously, and Karl yanked it away. “It is not just for you. The doctor—she earned it.”

  Lacing her fingers and pushing them together to force the fingers of her gloves to fit the wedges of her slender fingers more closely, she laughed. “I couldn’t possibly eat another bite. You men enjoy the rest. Thank you for driving me, Karl. Good evening.”

  Karl watched her walk to her home. That little sneak planned this escape, and that’s why she had me stop so she could eat on the way home.

  In an odd way, the fact that she had taken the first opportunity to run heartened him. If she felt nothing, she’d not be bothered by his interest. Clearly, he stirred up something deep within her. He hoped to continue to do so until the tiny spark turned to embers and finally flames.

  BANG! CLANG! BANG! CLANG! Karl spent much of the next day working on the forge. Taylor came in early that afternoon, insisting she needed to go check on Toomel. Karl argued with her, but she stubbornly insisted on going—alone. Finally he gave her strict orders. “Go, but only to Toomel. Check on him, and come right back. Stop nowhere else. There’s a storm on the way.”

  She promised and indeed, she was gone only long enough to make that trip. It wasn’t long thereafter when she came back to the livery again. He looked out at the darkening sky. Even if it wasn’t green, this was tornado weather if ever he’d seen it. “Where are you going?”

  “The Smith children are having some trouble.”

  “As many of them as there are, someone can load them in a wagon and haul them to your office.”

  “Not in this weather. Not with lung complaints. I oughtn’t have said even that much, Karl, but . . . please make haste.”

  He went ahead and hitched everything up. “With this storm on the way, you stay there if Smith advises you to.”

  “Don’t worry about me.”

  He didn’t bother to respond to that ridiculous comment as he guided the buggy out of the livery. “How did you know about the Smith kids?”

  “They sent Mr. Richardson in. He rode by and told me Grandma said it was urgent.”

  “Ja, then. Off you go.” He sent her off, then kicked himself. He probably should have gone with her. Smith had voted against having Doc Enoch come; he’d been volatile about getting rid of Dr. Bestman. But a father’s love could make a man do anything for his children—even send for a woman doctor.

  A half hour later she wasn’t back. But she’d probably just arrived, so of course she wouldn’t be back. Besides, she’d need time to work with the children. He’d give her forty-five minutes more.

  Forty-five minutes later, Karl told himself he’d give her a half hour more. He was starting to get antsy. If the children were in such a bad way, perhaps she’d need something. He’d seen her gather supplies for her pediatric calls often enough, so he was familiar with the sort of things that she sometimes used with the children. Karl picked up the key to her surgery that she tucked under a stack of his invoices whenever she left on a call. But when he got there, the back door was unlocked. Either she left in such a hurry, she didn’t take time to lock it, or Enoch was here. He pushed the door open. An immediate flurry of footsteps sounded.

  Sixteen

  Karl heard the front door open and raced toward the sound. But by the time he got to the porch, passing wagons blocked his vision of whoever had just darted across the street and obscured any footprints that might have been left.

  As he walked back through the office, Karl looked through her surgery. Doc always kept it so tidy. Everything looked right, but appearances could be deceiving. Somebody had been in the office—but why? The only thing that made him feel slightly better was that Taylor hadn’t been home. Maybe that was it: They were trying to rob her.

  He took the stairs two and three at a time and didn’t bother looking at the room he’d used as a hospital room. Nothing of value was in there. Enoch’s old room remained neat and undisturbed. But the window in Taylor’s room yawned wide open. Karl strode over to shut and fasten it. Books by the bedside, a Bible by the oak rocking chair, and a neatly made bed were tidy enough. The top drawer of the bureau was closed . . . almost. A sheer bit of cloud-weight cloth edged in spiderweb-fine lace hung out about three inches. His blood boiled. Someone had plowed through her unmentionables. She wouldn’t have left anything like that out. Knowing someone had done this would spook her, make her feel . . . Karl didn’t want to think how a woman would feel about such a thing.

  It wasn’t right for him to see the contents of such a drawer, so he turned sideways and tugged it open. His palms went sweaty, and Karl rubbed them on his pants, though a second glance proved they were far from clean. He looked around, then figured he’d nudge that lacy whatever back into where it belonged with that thin volume of . . . poetry. Sliding the book under something that didn’t weigh anything, while not looking, proved to be impossible. Kee
ping his back to the dresser, Karl peered beneath his arm. The crimson cover of the book reminded him of Doc’s shirtwaists. As he worked it beneath the unmentionable, Karl broke into a sweat. Eucalyptus. Camphor. Mustard. What else does Doc take when she sees kids? Candy. Ja. Candy. And camphor. Doc’s pretty, lacy whatever disappeared, and Karl slammed the drawer with such anger, the whole bureau jumped a good three inches.

  Dr. Bestman needed his help gathering medical supplies for this house call, but Taylor Bestman—the green-eyed, surprisingly feminine-beneath-the-surface woman—needed his help even more. No one was going to scare her or bother her again. He’d see to it.

  What else had been going on? Had the dirty mess he’d found her staring at in her surgical instrument drawer the night Enoch got married been part of a cruel plot? He was going to find out. Karl would wrangle every last detail from her. No more secrets.

  Back downstairs he gathered a few things he’d seen her use before with the children. He wasn’t quite sure how much should be taken, so he took some of the white jars with the pretty blue labeling on them and carefully put them in a crate. A length of the white flannel, another of the red. He wasn’t sure what else but figured she’d be able to make do if he forgot anything.

  Karl hefted the crate, began to walk, and then stopped dead in the kitchen. It was a complete disaster. The clinic had been spic and span, but her kitchen . . . He’d never seen such a mess. His first thought was to question if this was another underhanded threat, but then the truth dawned on him. The doctor couldn’t cook. All of the tasty food she’d been bringing him came after she’d been on a house call. Other women had made everything she’d shared. It all made sense. When would she have had time to bake the cookies or make a cake? She didn’t have milk in her house. How could she have made pudding? All this time, he’d been under the assumption she could cook—he’d even instructed her to burn food! Couldn’t all women cook? Then again, weren’t all doctors men?

  Life with Taylor as his wife would be far from normal, but it would be interesting—if he didn’t starve or die of indigestion. She, however, was more than worth the risks.

  When he reached the forge, Piet came out. “What are you doing?”

  “The doctor’s been gone awhile. I thought perhaps she would need these things.”

  Piet nodded. “This is good.”

  Karl suddenly changed his mind. He shoved the crate at his brother. “Go take them to her.”

  Piet’s eyes widened. “Me? You want me to take them to her?”

  “Until now, I’ve done all of the driving because of my leg. But now my leg is sound. You should do your share to fulfill the contract. I’ll finish that order.”

  Karl picked up his hammer. He needed Piet to leave before he tried to look for clues about who’d been in the doctor’s place. Had he told Piet anything, Piet would be underfoot . . . and very likely get himself stuck under a bed again. Pounding and striking sparks gave vent to his rage, yet brought no satisfaction. Until he hunted down whoever dared disturb Taylor’s place, there’d be no peace.

  Shedding her pelisse and peeling off her gloves, Taylor quickly assessed the situation. Daisy Smith’s baby was just getting the hang of sitting all by himself—meaning he was six or seven months old; yet the exhausted woman looked to be halfway through carrying yet another child. Though average-sized, the cabin seemed to have shrunk because of the harsh sounds of several children’s coughs. Miserable, the children wandered about and whined.

  “Mrs. Smith, I haven’t learned the children’s names yet. While I get them to sit in bed and do a quick check, please write their names and ages on a scrap of paper and pin it to their right sleeve.”

  “I’ll do that, Daisy,” an older woman with a toddler on her hip offered. “Children, girls on the red quilt bed, boys on the brown.”

  Harsh coughs shook several of the children, but only the youngest three weren’t struggling to breathe. It didn’t make sense. As a rule, the younger the child, the more fragile the health. “So the bigger boys and girls are having trouble. Has anyone at school been sick?” Quickly gathering information, Taylor washed her hands and made a hasty circuit around the beds, pausing at each child just long enough to assess the rate of breathing and lip color.

  “Suzannah, go sit over by the fireplace and read to Jackson for a little while. Mandy, why don’t you help your mama and grandma by stacking blocks for the babies?”

  Now Taylor could concentrate on the other children. She opened her physician’s bag and pulled out her stethoscope. She had work to do. After listening to Gilbert, she nudged him onward and pulled Nathan toward herself. She listened in silence for a moment and then gave her instructions to Grandma. “Keep Nathan over by the stove there and rub some of this vaporous salve onto his chest. Then have him dress in a flannel nightshirt and help him to stay warm.”

  The woman everyone in town called Grandma nodded. “I’ll do that.”

  An expectorant Taylor had made of inula helenium and althea officinalis would loosen the secretions. She drew it from her bag. The first spoonful went to little Lila. “She’s going to require a warming pack, if not a poultice.”

  “I’m clean out of flannel,” Daisy said, her voice crackling with pain and worry.

  “There’s a length in my bag.” Taylor didn’t permit anyone to reach into her medical bag. They could get poked or cut, or they might jumble the order of things. “I’ll get it for you.” After seeing to that and giving all of the other children a dose of medicine, Taylor coaxed everyone to have some tea. “The warmth will help keep the chest loose. Each of the children needs to be drinking plenty.”

  One of the little boys let out a rumbling cough. Grandma smiled. “Looks to be workin’ like a charm.”

  Taylor walked over to Mrs. Smith. “How are you doing with Lila?”

  “Not so good.” Deep lines of worry carved haggard furrows in Daisy’s face.

  Taylor’s heart went out to the woman. “Well, let’s take a listen to Lila.” She lifted the earpieces to her stethoscope. “She’s too weak and tired to bring up the secretions.” Without delay, Taylor took the child over to the bed and laid her so her head and chest hung over the side. Immediately, she massaged Lila’s back directly over the lungs. “Sitting upright has gravity pushing the secretions downward. This position will allow me to shake them from the lungs and have them flow out.”

  The method worked. Taylor didn’t mind applying logic and new solutions to problems if it was in her patient’s best interest. In this case, though, she didn’t delude herself. Once the medication wore off, Lila would be in distress once again. “I can leave you medication and directions on how to care for the children, but they still require far more care than you’ve been trained to render—especially Lila. She’s exceptionally delicate.”

  “Little Lila, she’s my only early-born babe. Puny and weakly most of the time. Sorta like a runt kitty. The cutest one that stays small and soft and steals your heart.”

  Smoothing back Lila’s stringy hair, Taylor smiled. “You are a beautiful young lady, Miss Lila.” Knowing how long the expectorant would last before it wore off, Taylor determined she could stay through an entire cycle or more still—even if Mr. Smith didn’t like having her there.

  He’d come into the house a couple of times already, casting visual daggers in her direction. Now, hand on the door, he stated in a rough voice, “Goin’ to get the boys now.” The door slammed.

  Daisy looked at him like a whipped puppy. She whispered tearfully, “I called you without my husband knowing.”

  “You realized your children needed help and reacted appropriately.”

  “But all this medicine and everything you’ve done—we don’t have any money.”

  With a houseful of children and a meager-sized farm, that fact had nearly shouted at her as she rode up. From Mr. Smith’s conduct, Daisy couldn’t very well publicly endorse Taylor’s care. Taylor thought about it. “We can make a deal.”

  Daisy looked mor
e terror-stricken. “Don’t think of the list,” Taylor said quietly. “I wouldn’t ask you to add your names to it.” As a guilty flush filled Daisy’s cheeks, Taylor spied a jar on the table. “I don’t know how to put up preserves.”

  I don’t know how to put up preserves.”

  “You don’t know how to put up preserves?”

  Lord, thank you for putting the right words in my mouth. “No, Daisy. I don’t.”

  “Won’t matter much,” Gilbert said. “Pa says you’re not going to stay.”

  Taylor turned to Grandma. “I won’t have any chance to preserve anything other than life. So . . .” She looked from Grandma to Daisy and back.

  “Better food’s not to be found. Daisy’s snap peas are sweeter’n any you’ve ever tasted.”

  “I’d be willing to barter canning for medical care. Of course, I’d provide the jars.”

  “I’ll tell Pa.”

  Suzannah knocked Gilbert in the arm. “You will not, tattletale.” The children began fighting. All of a sudden the coughing increased again.

  “You children cease that at once. If you don’t, the sour balls in my medicine bag are going to have to stay in there.”

  The children stopped immediately. “Sour balls?”

  “Yes, sour balls. At least I think that’s what I have in there today. I always keep a special treat in my bag, and I give one to each child when I leave if they’ve been very good.”

  Immediately the Smith children behaved better—but the minor exertion had tipped them back into wheezing.

  “Guess I’ll brew up some hog’s hoof tea.” Shoulders slumped in defeat, Daisy rose.

  Hiding her revulsion at that cure, Taylor asserted, “A mustard poultice would be far more effective now.” Truth be told, she had little else to suggest. Having dosed all of the children once with one curative and a combination of others, Taylor’s supply of medicaments had hit an all-time low.