The Doctor's Newfound Family

by Valerie Hansen

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “I had trouble accepting it, too,” she said, nodding and looking directly into his wide-eyed gaze. “But it’s true. All of it. Mama and Papa trusted him and he betrayed them.” She hesitated, weighing her words before she added, “I even suspect that he may somehow be responsible for their murders.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. He even tried to ship us back east. I saw the boat tickets with my own eyes.”

  Weeping, the boy tore himself from her grasp and ran. The only reason she didn’t immediately race after him was that he had headed back the way they’d come, in the direction of the orphanage.

  All she had to do was follow and hope that no one with nefarious connections spotted her or Luke on the street, alone and unprotected.

  She sighed. Gone was her joy in living, her sense of belonging in the city by the bay. Her childhood had been one of gladness, even before Papa Robert had married Mama, thanks to the benevolence of the Ladies’ Protection Society. As an adult, however, she saw what her mother had seen. The orphanage was not a place where she would choose to stay if she had any other options. It was shelter, yes, but it would never be a real home.

  Shivering, she once again folded her arms and began to trudge up the hill. In the distance, the mournful sounds of foghorns blended into a gloomy symphony that suited her mood perfectly.

  Shadows were deepening, heralding a dismal end of the formerly lovely day. At the base of the hill, she heard a fuss. Men were shouting. Many were cursing at the top of their lungs, much to her dismay. What in the world could be wrong?

  She heard someone shouting about the Bulletin and surmised that the ruckus stemmed from the shooting of its editor. Pausing to look back, she watched the crowd grow, saw torches, heard guns firing and hoped they were being shot into the air rather than into other men.

  Frissons of terror gripped her as more and more people ran past her and joined the mob. She was jostled. Shoved out of the way and off the walk into the muddy street.

  Struggling to keep her balance and also dodge the passing throng, she felt herself falter. Someone gallantly righted her. She turned to offer thanks. Her jaw dropped.

  Sheriff Scannell had hold of her arm and was grinning like a naughty little boy with a frog caught on his gigging fork.

  “Let me go,” Sara Beth demanded.

  The sheriff laughed. “You’re going all right. You’re going with me to jail.”

  “Why? I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “Breaking into a house that belongs to the government and trying to steal gold ain’t nothing, little lady. Don’t try to deny it. I seen you with my own eyes.”

  Chapter Twelve

  “Where is she? Where has she gone?” Taylor shouted. “How could you let her leave like that?”

  Ella was near tears and wringing her hands. “I didn’t let her. She went after the boy. What could I do?”

  “Which way was she headed?”

  “Toward their old house, I reckon. At least that’s what she said.”

  “All right. If I don’t find her and she comes back by herself, keep her here. There’s trouble brewing and I don’t want her caught in it.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  He figured it was better to frighten the matron with the truth than to let her blunder into danger due to ignorance. “Mob justice,” he said. “The Vigilance Committee is planning to issue an official proclamation and try to take this city back from the powers of corruption. In the meantime, I suspect there will be violence.”

  “Mercy. Miss Sara Beth might be caught in the middle.”

  “My conclusion exactly,” the doctor said.

  He dashed out the door and vaulted into his buggy. The horse seemed to sense his anxiety. It pranced and pawed at the ground. Taylor eschewed the use of a whip in most cases, but this time he cracked it in the air above the horse’s back and shouted, “Get up!”

  The buggy careened out of the drive and into the street. Wagon traffic was unusually light, due, he surmised, to the turmoil closer to the city center. The number of citizens filling the wide streets multiplied as he traveled west until he could barely steer a safe path through the pedestrians.

  It was all he could do to keep himself from plunging his rig into the crowd and trying to part it the way Moses had parted the Red Sea. Such a radical move was against the oath he had taken as a healer. He couldn’t bring himself to chance harming anyone, yet he saw no way to get closer and hopefully locate Sara Beth if he didn’t forge ahead.

  Standing in the buggy, he scanned the thronging masses. His nervous horse wanted to run but he held him in check. Most of the people in the street were men. That should make finding her easier. That, and the fact that she had no hat or bonnet and therefore her reddish hair would stand out.

  He was about to give up and climb down when he saw her. “Sara Beth! Over here,” he shouted.

  She turned her head, but instead of stopping and coming to him she continued to press on in the opposite direction.

  In seconds, Taylor understood why. She was being held prisoner! Sheriff Scannell was dragging her away by the arm.

  The buggy whip was in Taylor’s hand. His grip tightened. Urging the horse forward, he cracked the whip repeatedly to clear a path. “Out of my way. Move,” he yelled.

  The tactic was successful enough to bring him within whipping distance of the sheriff. Giving no thought to his own culpability, he reached out and stung Scannell on his ear.

  With a shout, the burly sheriff clapped a hand over that side of his face and raised his other arm to fend off more lashing. That was enough to give Sara Beth a chance to escape. She ran straight for the doctor’s buggy.

  Taylor gave her a hand up and pushed her into the seat, then flicked the whip one more time to keep Scannell occupied before he snapped the reins and gave the fractious horse its head.

  “Hang on!”

  “How did you find me?”

  “Divine providence,” Taylor shouted. “Keep your head down.”

  His wasn’t the only rig racing through the city streets. Bedlam reigned. Women screamed. Men scuffled and cursed. Mayor Van Ness had promised that troops under Sherman would contain this trouble, but it was clear that the army didn’t have nearly enough men on hand to keep the peace, no matter what orders the general gave.

  As far as Taylor was concerned, that meant only one thing. The revolt had begun. And the only safe place nearby would be Vigilance Committee headquarters on Clay Street. There, a makeshift fortification was being constructed out of sandbags in preparation for standing off the troops, if necessary, not to mention the so-called Law and Order party that the sheriff represented.

  “Where are we going?” Sara Beth screamed.

  “The closest safe place.”

  “What about Luke?”

  Taylor did his best to contain his fury, but he could tell she was sensing it in spite of his best efforts because she didn’t argue when he looked her in the eye and said sternly, “Believe me, Luke is the least of our worries right now.”

  Sara Beth had never seen the city in such an uproar, not even during one of the mild earthquakes that so often shook its citizens. This was different. This sense of disaster would not abate as soon as some worrisome tremors stopped.

  She hung tightly to the edge of the buggy seat and braced herself. Their trip consisted of periods of breakneck speed interspersed with zigzagging around other wagons, an occasional omnibus and men on horseback as well as people on foot. It looked as if every one of San Francisco’s eight thousand citizens was on the street at the same time. Some of the Chinese had even strayed from their usual section of the city and were mingling without censure, much to her surprise.

  It was as if the entire city had gone mad and she was trapped amidst the mass hysteria. Praise God that the doctor had come after her, or there was no telling what the sheriff might have done, especially since there seemed to be no real law left.

  She
tensed as Taylor turned onto Clay Street and reined in at an opening in a row of sandbags piled as high as a man’s shoulders.

  “You get off here,” he said.

  “Why? Where are you going?”

  “To check on King and then go look for your brother.”

  She reached for his arm and held tight. “Please don’t leave me. Not now. Not when this is happening.”

  “You’ll be safe in there with the Vigilance Committee,” Taylor told her, pointing.

  Her heart gave a sharp jolt and her already speeding pulse increased as he suddenly opened his arms and drew her into his embrace. She laid her head on his shoulder. “This is all my fault. I never should have gone after Luke. I just didn’t know what else to do.”

  “You’re responsible for him. I understand why you went looking. I just wish you’d gotten off the streets before this situation exploded.”

  “What’s going on, anyway? Why are the people so upset?”

  “This has been brewing for a long time,” he said. “It was the shooting of King that brought it to a head.”

  “Is he dead?” Sara Beth hoped it was not so because that would mean that Taylor had lost a good friend.

  “Probably,” he answered softly. “Either way, if Casey doesn’t have to stand trial, there will be more bloodshed.” He gave her a brief squeeze. “I’ll be back for you as soon as I can. There may be a curfew tonight. If there is, we’ll have to figure out another way to get you back to the orphanage.”

  He climbed down and reached for her. Sara Beth placed her hands on his shoulders and let him lift her by the waist, setting her on the walkway in front of the vigilante headquarters.

  “Take care of her,” he told one of the nearby men. “W.T. knows who she is and why she needs to be here.”

  Her eyes filled with tears and she choked back a sob as she watched her rescuer climb back into his buggy and drive off. She cared for him. Deeply. And she had never even spoken his first name aloud, let alone confessed her burgeoning affection. When Taylor returned she would do so, she vowed as the strange man took her arm and escorted her inside the building.

  In her heart she couldn’t help adding, If he returned.

  Taylor located Luke hanging around the docks in the company of some older, tough-looking youths, made certain the boy was once again confined at the orphanage, then headed back to claim Sara Beth.

  She greeted him with so much overt emotion he hardly knew how to respond. As she clung to him and wept, he gently enfolded her in his embrace. Was she truly so enamored of him, he wondered, or was she simply reacting to the fright she had experienced?

  He didn’t know, nor was he sure he should press her about it. They had only been acquainted for a few weeks and although they had worked well together, he still couldn’t accept anything more. He had his work. And she had her family’s welfare to consider. The little he earned from his practice wouldn’t come close to supporting her and her brothers in a proper manner.

  Finally, she dried her eyes on the handkerchief he offered and apologized. “I’m sorry. I was just worried sick about you.”

  “I’m fine. And so is your brother. I gave him another good scolding and left him under Mrs. McNeil’s watchful eye. She’s locked him in the boys’ ward. He won’t get away again.”

  “Oh, dear.” Sniffling, she shook her head. “I’m afraid Luke will see that as a challenge and double his efforts to escape. I don’t know what to do with him.”

  “One crisis at a time,” Taylor said, taking her hand and smiling. “The mob in the street has dispersed since they heard that King is still breathing and Casey has been hauled off to jail, mostly for his own safety, I assume. Things have quieted down enough that I can drive you home.”

  “All right. If you say so.”

  “I should be angry with you, you know.”

  I know,” Sara Beth said, averting her gaze. “But you’re not, are you? Not really.”

  There was no way Taylor could overlook the sweetness of her smile or the blush on her fair cheeks. Her hair had become mussed during her ordeal and the loose curls made her look like an endearing moppet. “No,” he said. “I’m not.”

  Her grin spread and her green eyes twinkled mischievously. “Good. I’d be terribly sad if you were.”

  “Sad enough to behave and stay safely away from the city center for a while?”

  “Well…”

  Her soft drawl and the way she was gazing into his eyes made him melt inside like butter on a summer’s day. This amazing young woman had led a sheltered life until mere weeks ago, yet she had coped and had blossomed in spite of the trials she’d been forced to endure. Many a man would have folded under less pressure.

  His gut twisted as she laughed lightly. “Don’t look so worried. I promise I shall behave as well as is sensible.”

  “That’s what worries me,” he quipped. When she reached up and gently caressed his cheek his knees nearly buckled.

  “Sweet, sweet man,” Sara Beth said. “You are so very dear to me.”

  “You’re just overwrought,” Taylor told her. “After things settle down and we get your inheritance back, you won’t feel that way.”

  The crestfallen look that came over her cut him to the quick and affirmed his suspicion that she was growing far too fond of him. That would never do. Once she was again part of the landed gentry of the city, she would have her choice of many suitors who could add to her holdings and support her properly.

  “Is there no swain waiting for you?” he asked.

  “Papa was asked for my hand in marriage recently,” she said, squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin to look at him with pride. “I refused the proposal.”

  “Why? Was the man unsuitable?”

  “I suppose not,” she replied. “I simply didn’t love him.”

  “Perhaps you should reconsider.”

  He could tell by the misty look in her eyes that she not only did not think his idea had merit, she was hurt by the suggestion. That meant only one thing. Sara Beth Reese had set her cap for him.

  Unfortunately, that distressing conclusion also warmed his heart and made him feel even more attracted to her than he had before.

  The ensuing few days seemed to creep by for Sara Beth. Tom King, James’s brother, had taken over the publication of the Bulletin and its editorials stirred up more unrest than they had before the shooting, especially once James King passed away.

  The poor man had lingered at death’s door longer than anyone had imagined he would, and in the interim a tenuous peace had returned to the city. In the end, his demise was caused, as Taylor had feared, by a raging infection.

  According to the current stories in the newspapers, Casey’s defense attorney was claiming that the death was brought about by the improper actions of King’s doctors, not by the initial shooting.

  That made Sara Beth furious. She could see no way that any judge or jury would believe such nonsense. If the bullet had not been fired in the first place, there would have been no wound to get infected.

  She said as much when Taylor Hayward finally returned to the orphanage. He had been conspicuously absent since she had confessed her tender feelings toward him, leading her to conclude that he did not share them as she had hoped. Nevertheless, she still wanted to assist him, so she proceeded to do so, behaving as if her heart had not been broken.

  “What’s the word on the Casey trial?” she asked, following him down the hall and hoping that making small talk would relieve some of the tension she felt between them.

  “Nothing new. Dr. Toland took the stand and swore under oath that it was that sponge in the wound that killed King, not the shooting.”

  “That’s a ridiculous conclusion.”

  “I agree,” Taylor said. “Hopefully the judge will, too.”

  “What about my house? Now that the Bulletin is only concerned with the King murder, what are my chances of getting justice?”

  “I don’t know. Word on the street is that Bein
is being investigated for a theft originally blamed only on your father. If they can pin any part of the crime on him, you should have a better chance to eventually lay claim to your property.”

  “What about Papa Robert’s good name? I can’t just stand by and let him be vilified.”

  “I don’t see how you’d ever prove his innocence. Not unless Bein confessed and exonerated him.”

  “Then that’s what I shall pray for,” she said flatly, keeping the rest of her thoughts to herself. There had to be some way she could help, something she could do. But what? And how could she be of any use as long as she was cooped up like a prisoner in this stone fortress of a mansion?

  If Taylor hadn’t been so deeply involved in the Vigilance Committee, she might have petitioned them to champion her cause. As things stood, however, she was certain he would intercept her plea and tell the others that it was a hopeless situation.

  Sighing, she realized that was probably a correct conclusion. It was a useless fight. She was barely old enough to be listened to, even if she had been a man, and since she was only a woman she had zero chance of being taken seriously.

  One more letter, she decided. She would pen one more letter, this time to Tom King, and hope he listened half as well as his elder brother had. If she could tie her problems to those of the rest of the city, perhaps he would print what she had to say.

  And this time she would not ask Taylor Hayward to deliver the letter. Nor would she trust Luke.

  This time, she would take it to the editor herself, even if she had to wear a disguise and sneak in his back door to do so.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The temporary fortification surrounding the building on Clay Street was made up of stacks of sandbags, planks, overturned wagons and anything else the vigilantes could lay their hands on. They had even managed to appropriate a cannon and place it conspicuously at the corner near Front Street, a further demonstration of their power.