Читать книгу A Convenient Wife - Carolyn Davidson, Carolyn Davidson - Страница 7

August, 1897

“I think I’m dying.”

If her eyes had not been filled with tears, and her expression so woeful, Winston Gray might have smiled. As it was, he adjusted his spectacles and cleared his throat. Clearly, the young woman huddled in a straight chair on the other side of his desk was in dire straits. But, dying? If clear skin, soft brown eyes and a full head of dark, waving hair gave any indication at all, he’d say she was in the best of health.

True, her form was slender, but not unduly so. And yet, there was a significant thickening of her waist and a suggestion of recent weight gain, if the fit of her dress was anything to go by.

“What’s the reason for you to be so worried?” he asked, watching as her slender hand lifted to swipe at the tears on her cheeks. Concern was written all over the girl, and suddenly he lost his urge to smile. Rising from behind his desk, he moved slowly to where she sat, pulling a second chair closer.

She looked up at him, her mouth working as though she might burst into a full-fledged crying spell any minute. “My mama died from a growth in her belly,” she whispered, and one hand spread across her own abdomen as she spoke. “I was only six years old, but I remember how she just got skinnier and skinnier, and her belly got bigger and bigger, till one morning she just stopped breathing.”

Dr. Winston Gray knew heartbreak when it stared him in the face, and he sensed the girl’s need for comfort. His large hand reached for hers, clasping it within his palm. “And you think you might have the same affliction?” he asked quietly.

She nodded, allowing the tears to flow now. “I’ve been feeling poorly lately, maybe for three months or so now. And my belly’s getting bigger all the time.”

And if his training had taught him anything, Win knew exactly what the girl’s problem was. “Is there any chance you might be in the family way?” he asked.

Her eyes widened and her head shook with a violent movement. “Heavenly days, no,” she blurted. “I’m not married, Dr. Gray.”

“That doesn’t always preclude a pregnancy,” he told her. “Perhaps you…” How to phrase it delicately, so she would not take offense? “Do you have a gentleman friend?”

Her flushed cheeks lost their color and she wilted in the chair, tugging her hand from his grasp. “No.” The single word was abrupt, and she straightened her shoulders. “Not anymore, anyway. Tommy Jamison used to come calling, but his folks moved back East a couple of weeks ago, and—” Her shoulders lifted in a telling shrug. “My pa didn’t like Tommy anyway, and now, with me probably dying, it’s just as well. His folks wanted him to go to college to get a good education.”

And likely, the mother had taken a good look at Tommy’s young lady and hustled her son as far away as possible from the problem he’d caused, Win surmised. He leaned his arms on his thighs and looked down at the wooden floor. How any young woman could be so ignorant was a puzzle he’d come across once before, and that time it had been solved neatly by a hasty marriage, aided by an angry father with a shotgun.

This particular situation didn’t look as promising.

“How old are you?” he asked, glancing up to see her blinking back another deluge of tears.

“Almost nineteen,” she whispered. “That’s too young to die, isn’t it?”

“You’re not going to die.” He hesitated, unwilling to speak further without at least knowing the girl’s name. “You’re George Mitchum’s girl, aren’t you?”

She nodded. “I’m Ellie. Eleanor, after my mama.”

“Ellie.” He tasted the name, liking its simplicity. “Do you have any female relatives? An aunt, maybe? Is there a housekeeper at your father’s ranch?” From what he’d heard, Win was certain the man could afford to hire a woman to live in and keep up his ranch house.

“No, there’s just me,” Ellie said, dashing his hopes. “I do the housework, and wash and cook for my pa and me.”

Win cleared his throat. This was getting stickier by the minute. “Would you mind coming into my examining room, Ellie? I’d like to take a look at you and listen to your heart.”

“My heart? What’s that got to do with it?” she asked. “One of these days it’s probably going to stop beating. Right now, it’s doing just fine.” She rose, and Win’s gaze fastened on her slender form.

“Come along, Ellie,” he said firmly, rising to his feet and grasping her elbow. “I’d like to check you over.”

She nodded slowly. “All right. If you say so. But I can’t imagine that listening to my heart is going to do much good,” she said glumly.

Probably not, he agreed silently. But it was a beginning.

The examining room was small, centered by a black, leather-covered table, which Ellie approached as if she were heading for the gallows. “You want me to sit up on this thing?” she asked hesitantly.

“No,” he responded. “I’d like you to lie down on it. On your back, please.”

She took his offered hand and hoisted herself up, stepping onto the small stool, then sitting erect for a moment on the side of the table. “You sure you want me lying down?”

He nodded, taking his stethoscope from a drawer in his metal cabinet. He turned back to her, watching as she tucked her skirts neatly beneath her legs. “Let me help you,” he offered, easing her head to the pillow he’d provided for his patients’ comfort. “I’m going to unbutton two buttons, Ellie,” he said easily, his fingers loosening the large, black buttons from their holdings. Sliding the bell of his stethoscope inside the bodice, he pressed it to her skin, just left of center, where her heart tones would travel up the rubber tubing he’d attached to his ears.

Closing his eyes, he listened, aware of her hesitant breathing, as if she must take the smallest breaths possible, making herself shrink into the surface of the table in order to escape the pressure of his hand. Her heart was a bit rapid, but he’d expected that. And, as he’d also expected, it was strong and regular.

He slid his hand from her dress, noting the flush that tinged her cheeks with color. “I’m going to press against your stomach, Ellie,” he told her, one hand judging the size of the fetus he was sure she carried. Indeed, it was a growth, one she would likely be carrying for a few more months, if he knew anything about it. Both hands measured her belly, pressing firmly against the expanded womb, and he wished he could perform a more accurate examination.

“You have a problem, Ellie,” he said agreeably, offering a hand to lift her to a sitting position.

“I told you so,” she muttered. “I knew it.”

“Have you spoken to your father?” he asked.

She shook her head. “We don’t talk much.”

“I think you have something you need to tell him. And if Tommy were handy, you’d be telling him about it, too,” he added.

Her eyes widened, their brown irises almost obliterated by black pupils. “What’s Tommy got to do with me dying?”

“Ellie, listen to me,” Win said slowly. “You’re not dying, my dear. Not for many years. The problem you have will be solved in about four months, if my calculations are correct.” He drew in a breath and tilted her chin with one long index finger, in order to look into her eyes. Bewildered eyes, he noted.

“You’re going to have a baby, Ellie. I would guess that Tommy is the father. Am I correct?”

“A baby? Tommy told me…” She halted, flushing deeply now. “He said if I loved him, I’d do what he wanted, and he was going to marry me anyway, so it would be all right.” Her eyes squinted shut. “He lied, didn’t he?”

“Maybe he intended to marry you,” Win told her. “Maybe he would have if his folks hadn’t taken him back East.”

“Maybe,” she agreed, and her eyes opened, a fierce anger darkening their depths. “I think I was a fool to believe him, Dr. Gray. I just needed somebody to love me.” The words were an anguished whisper, and Win’s heart jolted in his chest.

“We all need that, Ellie.”

She lifted her head and turned to look out the window, where white curtains hung to ensure privacy from the outside. Through their gauzy fabric, his backyard offered a bleak landscape. Dried grass and clumps of bedraggled perennials dotted the dry ground, and at the back of the lot an unpainted picket fence delineated his property line. “You need somebody to tend your yard,” Ellie said quietly. “Those flowers could use some watering.”

“I suppose,” he agreed, aware that she struggled to face her dilemma. “What will you do, Ellie?”

She slid from the table. “Go home, I suspect.”

“Will you tell your father right away?” He followed her from the room, through his office and to the waiting room, fortunately empty of patients this late in the afternoon.

“Maybe. I don’t know. He’ll probably figure it out for himself soon enough.”

Win was surprised he hadn’t already, given the tight fit of Ellie’s dress. She was carrying high, and her waist had expanded enough to pull the buttons taut. “Will he help you?” Win asked.

Her shrug expressed doubt. “He don’t much care about me, Dr. Gray. So long as I keep things up, he lets me be. But he’s got a temper. I’ve seen him pretty near kill a horse that made him mad, and one day he beat the bejabbers out of a ranch hand who got drunk and didn’t get out of bed the next morning. Sent him on his way afoot, just carrying his saddle and a bundle of his belongings.”

“Are you afraid of him?”

She turned to face him, and Win saw the hesitant working of her mouth. “A little, maybe. Depends on how bad he needs me to work for him, whether or not I need to be dodging his fists.”

His stomach knotted as Win noted the lack of color in Ellie’s face. “Has your father abused you?” he asked.

She hesitated. “Not bad, no. He’s smacked me a couple of times, but he pretty much lets me be. I just know he’s going to be awfully upset when he finds out about this.” Her hand touched her abdomen, fingers widespread as if she could somehow protect the child within.

And wasn’t that a pretty future for a girl to face, he thought with a lump of despair in his throat. “If I can help in any way, Ellie, you know where to find me.”

He held the door open for her and she walked out into the late-afternoon sunshine. Hesitating on the stoop, she looked up at the sky, where clouds floated on currents of air. Those same winds held birds suspended aloft, wings outspread as they circled high above the wheat fields outside of town. “Sure is a pretty day, isn’t it?” she murmured, then, stepping to the ground, she trudged down the path to his gate.

“Come back to see me,” Win called after her impetuously, waiting for her nod as she unhitched her horse and climbed into the buggy next to his gate. He watched the slow movement of the horse as Ellie turned in a half circle, heading toward the main part of town. The dainty mare picked up her feet in a trot as she moved toward the mercantile, where townsfolk were still moving in and out of the wide double doors.

Ellie slid from the buggy seat, and Win watched as she tied her horse, then stepped onto the wide boardwalk and into the store. Her hand on the door, she turned in his direction and hesitated, then lifted her other hand in a small salute.

Grim. Her prospects were grim, he decided, walking back to his house, where the small waiting room, office and examining room took up fully half of the downstairs space. He straightened a chair near the door, then walked on through to where his cluttered desk awaited his attention. Several files, yet to be noted with patient information, were stacked on the right side of his blotter, and he settled into his chair to do the jotting of symptoms and treatments he’d diagnosed and prescribed for each patient.

Paperwork was the bane of his existence, but it was a necessary thing, and he bent to it with a will, aware that he must make notes while his mind still retained the information from today’s patients. Swiftly, he tended to business, moving the stack from one side of his desk to the other, noting with relief the absence of dire illness in the day’s allotment of sickness. The usual chronic ailments were to be expected: dyspepsia, a cough that seemed to have no reason for being, a broken arm to be checked and sutures to be removed from a ranch hand’s leg—the result of a horse’s misplaced hoof.

A clean file was taken from his drawer, a clean sheet of lined paper inserted and a name written on the top line. Ellie Mitchum. He looked at it, then added, in parenthesis, Eleanor. Age, eighteen. The next line was filled in neatly. Heart tones normal, skin clear, eyes…eyes, brown, he thought, his pen held over the paper. Hair, dark and waving.

Abdomen, filling slowly, but surely, with a baby whose mother could find no joy in the news of its conception.

Tess Dillard cast Ellie a glance, then took a second look, her forehead furrowing into a puzzled frown. “I haven’t seen you in a while, child,” she said softly. “You haven’t been to town lately, have you?”

Ellie shook her head. “I wouldn’t be here today, but for some things my pa forgot when he came in last week. I usually just give him a list of what we need, but he left it home last time.” And besides, she’d wanted to see the doctor. For all the good that had done her.

“Well, let me see what we can do for you,” Tess said, reaching for the folded slip of paper Ellie held. Her fingers touched the back of Ellie’s hand and lingered. “Are you feeling well?” she asked kindly.

Ellie stiffened, looking around for listeners. “Of course, I’m fine, Mrs. Dillard. I just have to hurry along today. I’ve got supper in the oven, and I need to be home before the roast gets overdone. Pa doesn’t like his meat cooked all the way through.”

Tess reached to the shelf behind her and lifted a metal container to the counter. “I’ve got spices in here,” she said, sorting through the tins it held. “Here we go. Cinnamon, and there’s another of nutmeg. Are you doing a lot of baking these days, Ellie?”

Ellie nodded. “I make pies for the men. Clyde does their meals, but I fix cookies and such for them. I only cook for Pa and me in the house.”

“Well, let’s see what else you need.” Tess placed the list on the counter and turned back to her shelves. “I’ve got liniment and a fresh supply of Dr. Wilden’s stomach remedy.” Her sharp eyes honed in on Ellie’s face. “Is that for you? You’re not feeling well?”

“Pa gets heartburn lately,” Ellie said quickly, feeling the telltale blush rise to color her cheeks as she told the blatant lie. “Don’t forget I need sugar, too, Mrs. Dillard.”

“Yes, all right,” Tess said, eyeing Ellie with suspicion. She leaned over the counter, her voice low. “If you need someone to talk to, I’m always available, honey. I know you’ve missed havin’ a mama in your life.”

“I’m fine,” Ellie said, desperate to be on her way. “Just put my total on the book if you will. Pa will pay when he comes to town next.” She gathered up the small pile of bottles and tins Tess had placed before her and held the assortment in both hands.

“Here, put that in this box,” Tess said, reaching beneath the counter for an empty cardboard container. Adding the sack of sugar, she reached for a peppermint stick and placed it amid Ellie’s purchases. “That’ll settle your stomach, Ellie,” she said quietly, pushing the box across the counter. “Just remember, I’m here if you need me.”

And that was the second offer she’d had today, Ellie thought, lifting the box and heading for the door. Striding out onto the sidewalk, then stepping down to the road, she ignored the passersby, nodding only when the tall minister of the Methodist church spoke her name.

“Ellie, we haven’t seen you in Sunday morning service for a long time. Don’t be a stranger now, you hear?” Reverend Fairfax said with a wide smile. He tipped his hat and moved along the road, speaking to another of his parishioners as he made his way toward his own buggy.

“I doubt you’ll be seeing me at all,” Ellie muttered beneath her breath as she untied the mare from the hitching rail. The box with her purchases settled beneath the seat, she climbed into the buggy and turned the mare toward home. Although seeing the kindly minister would have been a logical move if Tommy had stayed here, instead of moving back East. If he’d told his mother that he wanted to marry Ellie.

She sighed, envisioning the event. Her with a new dress maybe. Tommy with his hair slicked back and his smile flashing just for her benefit. She frowned, closing her eyes, as his image eluded her, replaced by the tall, kindly man who’d just rocked the very foundations of her world.

Winston Gray. No problem recalling him, she thought with a flash of humor.

Now, as to Tommy… Ellie squinted as the buggy headed toward the setting sun. Funny, she could barely remember what he looked like. And he was supposedly the love of her life. Although, hard as she tried, today she couldn’t come up with much more than lukewarm feelings for the man.

That she’d been a fool to listen to his palaver was a given. He’d played her like a shabby fiddle, plucking at her strings, telling her she was beautiful, just the girl he needed for a wife.

Beautiful, indeed. As if plain brown hair and eyes that matched were anything to talk about. But she’d listened, bewitched by the running on of his compliments, intrigued by his kisses that promised pleasure. But there’d been no pleasure to be had in his taking of her body, only a painful, embarrassing few minutes of prodding and thumping on her, while Tommy wheezed and groaned against her ear.

She’d been a fool. That fact recognized, she set about working on a plan to get her future in order. The first thing would be to tell Pa. And to that end, she set her jaw and considered the best way to approach George Mitchum.

No matter what she’d done, the results would have been the same, Ellie realized. She crawled with effort into her bed, aching in every muscle, bruised from the blows she’d accepted as her due from the man who’d sired her. The man who’d told her in no uncertain terms that she was no longer welcome in his house.

“You’ve got till tomorrow morning to be gone from here,” he’d shouted as she’d huddled in the corner of the kitchen. “I won’t have a bastard in this house. I always knew you were just like your ma. You’ll no doubt have a simpering girl child, just the way she did. Worthless females, both of you.”

Supper forgotten on the table, he’d stormed out the back door, leaving Ellie to consider the condition of her body. Her face hurt from two sharp slaps, and unless she was mistaken, her eye was swollen. If the aching in her arms was any indication, there’d be bruises turning blue by morning, where great hammy fists had punched her as she’d sought to protect the child she carried.

Her backside throbbed from several kicks and her legs bore bloody scuff marks from George’s boots, but there hadn’t been any serious bleeding done, and for that she supposed she should be thankful. She’d thought at first that he would surely kill her, but his look of disgust had not included a gleam of hatred akin to murder in his eye.

She sighed, curling beneath the quilt. Maybe Tess Dillard would be the person to seek out. Perhaps she could use a hand in the store, at least until Ellie found a better solution to her problem. And that didn’t seem likely, at least not for the next few months.

The house was quiet when she crawled from her bed, donning the same dress she’d worn yesterday. Her other two dresses, one she wore to do chores, the other her Sunday best, hung in the wardrobe and she gathered them, along with a spare petticoat and her good drawers, folding them all neatly into a small bundle. Two pairs of stockings completed her pile of belongings, and she stuffed the lot into a small valise that had been her mother’s.

Her chest of drawers held extra bed linens and a shawl. The shawl she took, along with her comb and brush and a small bottle of scent Tommy had presented her with. Lily of the Valley, it said on the gilt label, and she smiled ruefully as she recalled her pleasure in the gift.

On second thought, she decided, she’d do just as well without any reminders of Tommy, and cast the bottle aside. It was about as worthless to her as the promises he’d made and broken. She surely didn’t need to smell good for his sake anymore.

Damn Tommy Jamison, anyway. “I hope he rots in hell,” she whispered, and then slapped a hand over her mouth as she muffled the curse word she’d said aloud.

The kitchen was empty, the coffeepot cold. Pa must have taken breakfast with the men in the bunkhouse, she decided, heading for the pantry. Last night’s leftover beef and cooked carrots were on a platter, covered with a dish towel, and she wrapped a good portion in a clean napkin. It might be a long time before she found something else to eat.

Her final act was to take the sugar bowl from its place on the kitchen dresser. A handful of coins were in the bottom of the flowered china container. Pa didn’t hold with fancy dishes on the table, preferring to take his sugar from a jar. Ellie had squirreled away all her meager savings in the last piece of china left from her mother’s good dishes, and thankfully, George hadn’t discovered the cache.

She dumped them into her small reticule and replaced the bowl. Then in a moment of rebellion, she snatched it back and settled it in the top of her valise.

“It’s the last thing I have of yours, Mama,” she whispered. “I won’t leave it for him.”

The faraway sound of men’s voices came to her as she walked out the back door, looking toward the near pasture. The big farm wagon rolled across its width, filled with men holding scythes, her father holding the reins of his team of draft horses. One of the men, John Dixon, looked up, nudged another, and shook his head slowly in her direction.

Whether it was an expression of sympathy or a declaration of disgust she couldn’t tell, and as she set off staunchly down the lane toward the town road, she decided she didn’t care.

That she was a fallen woman was a fact she could face. That her father had turned on her with a vengeance beyond belief was more than a reality, as her bruised and battered body could attest. Her hips ached as she walked the length of the pasture fence. Her eye throbbed, and she squinted through its swollen slit as she turned onto the dirt track leading to Whitehorn.

The load she carried, her valise in one hand, her bundle containing food and every cent she owned in the world in the other, was heavy, yet not nearly so weighty as the pain of being an outcast. “He never loved me, anyway. I don’t know why I’m surprised he wouldn’t let me stay on and work for him,” she murmured to herself. “If I’d been a boy like he wanted, he might have been different.”

And wasn’t that the truth. She wouldn’t be in this fix if she’d been a boy. She’d have been the one doing the sweet-talking and taking advantage.

No. She shook her head. Even as a man, she wouldn’t have done what Tommy did, hurting another human being the way he had. Running off back East with his folks, not even a goodbye issued in her direction.

Useless. Pa had called her that, plus a few other choice names, none of which she felt were fit to pass between her lips. Her chin lifted as she paced along on the side of the dusty road. It was only two miles to town. She could make it in less than an hour.

And then what?