“Did he say anything?”
“He asked where he was.”
“What’d you tell him?”
“The truth.”
His eyes narrowed. “What are you not telling me?”
The whole truth.
She pulled her shawl from the rocker and wrapped it around her shoulders on her way out of the room. “It’s cold. I’ll tend to the fire.”
“Lena—”
Pausing at the door, she added, “The dog won’t bother you. I’ll bring coffee before sunup. He should be out for that long.”
A few coals winked on the dining room hearth, and she stirred them before adding bits of kindling, larger sticks, and finally an arm-sized log. Smoke spiraled upward, then the smaller pieces caught and the fire flashed to life. She added two more logs, then set the screen in place and wound the mantle clock. Two-thirty.
The kitchen cook-stove fire had been well banked, and it took only a few cedar shavings to revive it and start a pot of coffee.
She twisted her hair into a knot and located three pins still clinging to tangles. They’d hold until she collected the others.
Too tired to work by lamplight and too tense to sleep, she returned to the dining room and pulled her rocker close to the hearth. The wind had kicked up, rattling Tay’s sign on the front porch, swinging it noisily back and forth. They’d all need laudanum to sleep with that racket.
Through the cover of her shawl, she gently rubbed her tender wrist and wondered who had been more frightened—the stranger or her.
It was the uncovering that angered her. The brutal stripping away of her customary concealment.
The shock on his face betrayed what he thought. What everyone thought when they saw her deformity up close. The result of an uncertain doctor’s attempt to save a little girl’s hand.
She stared into the fire, seeing again the cabin hearth of her childhood, hearing her mother weep, Tay wretch. Papa held her in his big arms and pressed her head into his shoulder as the doctor eased her left arm from the safety of Papa’s embrace…
As delayed as a child’s anticipated Christmas, her hands began to tremble and she swaddled them in her shawl, annoyed at her lack of self-control. For twenty years she’d lived and managed. For the last five, she’d helped Tay, relinquishing dreams of her own home, a loving husband, children.
The older she grew, the more clearly she saw the way men averted their gazes. Polite, but uninterested. Who wanted a maimed wife? One who didn’t even have the finger on which to place a wedding band?
Always, this time of year brought the heaviest torment. Always in the evenings approaching Christmas, when light fled and cold lurked around the house.
The smell of scorched coffee roused her, and she hurried to the kitchen and the boiling pot. How long had she huddled by the fire, lost in her musings? She ground more beans, added fresh water, and returned it to the stove.
Through the glass in the kitchen door, the sky was graying, melting the stars and waking the neighbors’ rooster that seemed to relish rousing the community.
“Er, er, er-roo,” it cried.
In a moment an answer rang across the field. “Er, er, er-roo.”
Papa’s voice shimmered through her memories, interpreting the early morning call from one proud bird to another.
Lock the barn door!
Give me the key!
Some things couldn’t be forgotten.
~
The ceiling was white-washed.
Wil rubbed his eyes and blinked. White as milk and near blinding to a man accustomed to sky. He pushed up on his elbows and clenched his teeth at the impulse to yell. Moaning wasn’t so easily squelched.
The dog raised its head over the cot’s edge and studied him.
A light-haired man entered through the single door in the room and stopped short.
“Good morning.” Grabbing a piano stool, he continued to the cot where he fixed the stool close by and sat upon it.
Wil looked around for the piano he must have missed the night before, but found none.
“How do you feel?” The man extended his hand. “I’m Dr. Carver, and you are…”
“In pain.”
Humor livened the doctor’s eyes, similar to his wife’s, though clearly green. Maybe hers were too.
He maintained a professional demeanor and lowered his hand. “Indeed, you must be. My assistant and I have been trying to figure out what happened to you that would snap your fibula, dislocate your ankle, and flay your skin. We know what parted your hair.”
Suddenly aware of the injury, Wil sat farther up and fingered the right side of his skull. Sure enough, a greasy line met his inspection and joined his growing list of painful spots.
The dog eyed Carver, at ease with his close proximity. Man must be who he said he was.
“How long have I been here?”
“Since yesterday morning.” Carver turned up the wick, then lifted the lamp and leaned in. “Look straight over my shoulder and try not to blink. I want to check your eyes, see if you have a concussion.”
“How’d I get here?”
Doc peered through his soul for a spell, then set the lamp on the table. Turned Wil’s left wrist over and compared his pulse to the rhythm of an open-faced pocket watch. “I brought you.”
While Carver followed the clock’s hands, Wil took the man’s measure. Not six feet, fine-boned but not frail. Again, similar to his wife.
Wil doubted the doctor could lift him. “Where’d you find me?”
Carver pocketed his watch. “What’d you say your name was again?”
Wil allowed the man had probably seen his share of broken limbs and gunshot wounds, and probably his share of liars, based on his narrowed green gaze. Since Wil’s name was one of the few things he remembered, he might as well share it.
“Wil Bergman.”
Recognition and curiosity collided in an ill-hidden stare.
Wil reached for his vest, clearly not hanging from his bare shoulders. “Where are my clothes?”
Doc collected himself and his professionalism. “Wasn’t much left of them.”
Wil’s insides sank. “What about my coat and vest? And my hat.” He sat up straighter and flinched, adding between clinched teeth, “My horse and tack.”
Carver shook his head. “None of the above. Just you, one boot and sock, woolen trousers, a neckerchief—remarkably—and a shredded blue shirt, which we took the liberty of throwing away. Lena will have your trousers ready this afternoon, but I’m going to cast your leg first. The bones need to be immobilized, and this splint won’t do it well enough. I’ll find a nightshirt for you, since my shirts won’t fit.”
Stubbornness fired up through Wil’s core, and he swung his legs over the edge of the cot. The wooden splint hit the floor, and pain shot him clean out of the saddle.
Carver grabbed him under the arms and helped him onto the infernal excuse for a bedroll. The ground would have served better, but not with a busted leg and no riggin’. No horse. And no idea what had happened.
He fell back onto the pillows, again thrashing tender skin, and bit down on a slew of cuss words that would paint that blasted ceiling blue and his ma red with shame.
Carver uncorked the brown bottle.
Wil shook his head. “I can’t think as it is. No more of that poison. I prefer to dull the pain, not my mind. Do you have any whiskey?”
The doctor glanced over his shoulder, then set the laudanum on the washstand and went to the glass-doored cabinet across the room. Squatting before it, he opened a bottom door and reached his arm’s length inside.
He returned with a tall unlabeled bottle and a short glass. “Kessler’s best,” he said, pouring half a glass. “But just between you and me.”
Wil pushed up on his elbow, downed the liquid fire, and eased back again, waiting for the doctor to take a swig.
Instead, he corked the bottle and returned it to the cabinet.
At least Wil wasn’t in the hands of
a drunk. But he had no intention of ending up addicted to laudanum like too many sorry cusses he’d seen. He’d have to ride out the storm.
Hard to do without his horse.
Carver took his stool again, a whole battery of questions marching across his face.
Wil stalled him a second time. “Before you start, tell me exactly where you found me.”
Doc braced a hand on each leg. “I was on my way out of town early yesterday morning, about to start my rounds, when I found you propped against a ponderosa pine about two miles north on the main road.”
Wil must have telegraphed his doubt, because Carver chuckled and shook his head. “I know. Unbelievable. If I didn’t know better, I’d say someone left you there so I’d find you.”
He leaned slightly forward. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
A movement at the doorway caught Wil’s eye and interrupted Carver’s inquisition.
“Lena, perfect timing.” Doc rose and took a tray from her. “I’ll hold this while you set the pillows up behind Mr. Bergman.”
She paused, eyes shifting to the dog and then to the cot, avoiding Wil’s. Sure enough, green like her husband’s.
Closing in, she bent to arrange the pillows and clicked her tongue.
“Stay as you are, and I’ll change your dressing. You’ve nearly rubbed everything off, including the salve. What have you two been doing? Arm wrestling?”
Doc set the tray on the long table and brought over two cups of coffee. The smell warmed Wil’s senses and roused his stomach’s hope for solid food in light of the whiskey in his belly.
An apology for brutalizing Mrs. Carver circled the back of his brain, but so did a wagonload of rocks.
She dressed his wounds, and after she finished, leaned toward his shoulder and sniffed.
He angled away. “I smell?”
She tucked the basin full of bloody bandages against her hip. “No, but Mr. Kessler does.”
Doc coughed, bouncing his shoulders as well as coffee from the cups as he handed over Wil’s.
The first sip went down hot, strong, and smooth, better than any trail coffee he’d had. “That hits the spot, Mrs. Carver. Thank you kindly.”
She opened her mouth, but Doc spoke. “Lena is my sister.”
The look she shot the doctor could have split a stump into kindling at a hundred yards.
CHAPTER 4
Wil had been sleeping on the cot for two weeks, and feared he’d go loco before long. Aside from Doc’s help to the privy outside and the kitchen for meals, he was confined to the cramped corner or to the dining room they didn’t use for dining. Where he sat now with his casted leg elevated on a chair near the hearth. A sight warmer than the surgery.
The dog lay in front of the hearth, halfway between him and Lena Carver, but watching him, not her.
Lena had ridden a wide circle around him until lately. A lively conversationalist at the table, she had an opinion about everything and didn’t mind expressing it. Including her preference of Lena over Miss Carver. But otherwise, she managed to keep her distance from him, and Wil knew why.
His ma hadn’t raised no heathen, and he felt like a heel for frightening the gal that night he came to with her in his face. But they were never alone for him to apologize. And he was fairly certain her brother didn’t know what had happened. Letting him hear an apology might throw grease on an otherwise friendly fire.
All Wil could do was watch her in hopes of catching those green eyes, but she was a master at avoidance.
So was her brother when it came to talk of the livery.
If Wil had to drag himself into town, he would. Last he’d heard, his Uncle Otto owned the livery stable in Piney Hill, and Wil had written ahead that he was riding this way in hopes of wintering there, then scouting out the country. A gullet full of trail dust had put him in mind of his own herd and enough land that he could ride out a ways if the settled feeling got to be too much for him.
Colorado was as good a place as any to raise a few beeves, but his plans went slack somewhere between the road south from Denver and the outskirts of Piney Hill.
All those nights he’d stayed at camp when the boys lit out for the nearest bar to throw their money at liquor, cards, and women. All those months he’d added to his stash, rolling it in an old sock and tucking it deep in his saddlebags. All those dreams of having his own spread.
Everything he had was in his vest and saddlebags. Now his stake was gone, along with his good horse, saddle, and rifle. So was any memory of what happened to him. One day he’d accepted his pay, thanked the trail boss, and turned Duster south.
Next thing he knew, a beautiful woman was dangling from his hands, while railroad spikes drove through his busted leg with every heartbeat.
He owed the Carvers plenty. From what he’d seen delivered to the house and heard referenced at the supper table, Doc took anything for payment, from eggs and milk to bed sheets and horse feed.
But Wil didn’t have anything to give the man and his sister. The shirt on his back belonged to someone else, some generous soul he didn’t even know.
“How long before I’m sound enough to leave?”
Lena sat tearing bandages as if he didn’t exist.
The doctor took off his spectacles, laid them on a medical book in his lap, and gave Wil a longsuffering look. The kind he might give a clueless child.
“You can’t put full weight on it for another six weeks. The fibula needs time to reattach and heal solid. Without that happening, you’ll be a cripple the rest of your life.”
Same answer as the other two times he’d asked. Fewer weeks, but they still tallied up to eight.
And the answer still stuck in his craw.
He never had been good at confinement, the primary reason he’d left home as a kid and trailed that first herd. But wintering with his uncle had made sense. He could help. Curry and comb, muck stalls. Pitch hay and pay for his board. Nailing shoes on might be a stretch now, given his busted leg.
The timing couldn’t be worse.
He leaned toward a stack of firewood at the end of the hearth, calculating how far he needed to go to get Lena’s attention. A quick reach for a split log tipped the chair.
She looked up.
Using the log to brace himself, he locked on her, refusing to look away.
Beg your pardon, he mouthed.
Her eyes flicked to his lips and back. She puffed a sigh, then gave a short nod and went back to tearing strips.
Somewhat satisfied, he scooted to the edge of his chair and tossed the log onto the fire. “How far to the livery?”
Sister and brother exchanged a glance, and the spectacles came off again.
“Do you have a horse there?”
“Wish I knew. But I need to see if the owner is my uncle. If he is, he might have seen Duster or heard about what happened.”
That stilled the bandage tearing.
“Duster?”
“My horse.”
Doc fiddled with his eyeglasses, then smoothed his already smooth hair. “What’d you say your uncle’s name was?”
As if he didn’t know. “Otto Bergman. Big German, built like a tree.”
Doc closed the book and laid it aside with the spectacles on top. “Think you could work crutches and not put weight on your leg?”
“I can crow hop, it that’s what you’re asking.”
Lena’s mouth curved in what some folks might consider a smile.
Her brother left the room, but she didn’t follow him.
Wil leaned forward to scratch the top of his propped-up foot. “Is he always this talkative?”
The almost-smile flashed again, but she cut him a warning instead. “He’s been holding off on the crutches because you’re too eager to get on your feet. If you rush things, you could re-break your leg, get it infected, and slow your recovery. You need to just do what he says.”
Her left hand slid under the apron.
He’d been staring and hadn’t realized
it. “I didn’t mean to—”
“Stare?”
Her candor shamed him even further, but a thud-clomp-thud in the hall derailed his mental scrambling.
The bottom end of two crutches popped over the threshold, and the doctor swung himself through, landing on one foot. The other was bent up behind him. He crossed the room, turned, and crossed again before stopping in front of Wil and offering him two well-used wooden crutches, the tops wrapped in lamb’s wool and doe skin.
“Let’s see what you can do.”
Wil took hold of the long, smooth brace pieces and slowly stood on his right leg. The crutches weren’t long enough for his height, but at this point, he’d try branding irons.
One pass across the room was easier than he’d expected, but turning around was trickier. He felt like a newborn calf trying to gather its legs. Falling wasn’t an option, and it near wore him out.
He pivoted and planted the wooden pegs, tempted to lower his left foot for balance.
“Don’t do it.” Carver had the same authoritative eyebrow Wil had seen on his sister.
He raised his foot, irritated by his weakened state and annoyed at how heavy the plaster was. “Can you take off the cast?”
“Absolutely not. Cross the room again. And don’t set that left foot down or I’ll tie it up.”
Under different circumstances, he’d like to see Doc try it and not come away needing a cast himself.
He must have scowled, for Lena covered her mouth.
Two more passes across the room, and he had to sit down. More like fall down, but he did land in the chair.
“Not bad, not bad,” Carver said as he picked up his spectacles and book. “Tomorrow morning, Lena can help you navigate the front steps, then you can take a spin around the house and cabin. I’ll be making my calls, but if you’re up to it after dinner, we’ll go to the livery.”
Lena’s hornswoggled look boded poorly for her brother’s recruiting tactics.
Wil didn’t need an angry nursemaid telling him how to get around. He’d go to the livery on his own. “Where is it?”
“Farther than you think.”
He didn’t much cotton to the view from under somebody else’s thumb. But he’d been out cold when he came to the Carvers’ home and had no idea about the layout of the town. It couldn’t be too different from every other wide spot in the road he’d ridden through, and he guessed the livery was at one end.
Snow Angel: a romantic Christmas novella Page 3