Читать книгу Klondike Medicine Woman - Linda Ford - Страница 9

At the sound of voices close to his head, Jacob was instantly awake and paused to orientate himself. He’d slept on the ground, softened by furs Mack had sent him. Burns had returned about 11:00 p.m., all wound up because it stayed light so late.

“A person never needs to go to bed.”

“You’ll want to sleep sometime.” Jacob wasn’t sure he’d ever been so enthused about staying up all night. Or so eager to experience life.

He glanced across to where Burns had thrown himself down on his own soft fur and lay snoring gently, his arms outflung like a baby. He didn’t look as if he meant to leave his bed in search of adventure for several more hours.

Jacob smiled, a feeling of affection and protectiveness warming his insides. He’d grown fond of the boy. Perhaps Burns reminded him in a small way of Aaron—young, naive, so certain adventure carried no risks. Maybe Jacob could make up for not being able to protect Aaron by keeping Burns out of danger.

The noise outside his tent grew louder and Jacob scrambled from his covers. He checked Donald. Several times in the night, he’d risen to tend the man, who rested quietly at the moment. A quick glance at his pocket watch, where he’d left it on a small table by his makeshift bed, revealed it was—

He grabbed his watch and held it to his ear. Yes, it ticked. He wound it to make sure. Four in the morning, and yet the racket outside gave him reason to think it was high noon. One voice called, “Right there is good, boys.” It sounded as if the speaker was only a few feet away. A crash fairly rocked him where he stood. Burns grunted and rolled to his side. Donald started, moaned and sank back into oblivion.

Jacob took a moment to smooth his hair. His chin was rough with whiskers. At some point he needed to shave. But first he had to find out the cause of the commotion outside. He pushed aside the tent flap and slapped at the cloud of mosquitoes attacking him.

A handful of men, nudging each other and jeering, stood watching two people struggle with armloads of lumber.

“Frankie, hang on. It ain’t that heavy,” one of the wood-toting persons called.

“You wait until I get a good hold, and don’t drop it without telling me. You left me holding the whole thing,” Frankie sputtered as he rubbed his palm.

“Daylight is wasting.” The second person tapped a mud-covered boot and glanced at the sky, as if to suggest the sun was crossing the sky at a furious pace.

“You tell ’er, Margie,” one sunburned man yelled.

This was a woman? And Frankie, too? The women Mack had said would help? Jacob took a good look at the pair. Both had dark, short hair—or at least what he could see of it, hidden by knitted caps, suggested so. Both dressed in plaid jackets that seemed to be uniform for both native Alaskans and the bulk of the outsiders. And both stood with feet planted a good width apart.

“You gonna take that from your sister, Frankie?” another spectator called. “Come on, show her who’s boss.”

Plainly, the onlookers hoped to see a fight between the two. In fact, he figured the men itched to get a good brawl going. Jacob took a step forward, hoping to prevent such a thing.

The one called Frankie closed the distance separating her from her sister, her expression dark and forbidding.

The men cheered.

Frankie stood in front of her sister and planted her hands on her hips.

The cheering intensified.

Jacob held his breath, wondering if he’d be handing out dressings in the place of his future clinic.

Both women let out a whoop that sent shudders down Jacob’s spine and, laughing uproariously, threw their arms around each other, administering vigorous back pats.

The crowd muttered their disappointment and most of them moved off to attend to their own affairs. That’s when he saw the Indian woman again. Teena Crow, she had said was her name. Her dark eyes watched him with unwavering purpose. I will help you. You will help me. His face felt brittle. His eyes stung as he silently signaled his determination. It would not happen. He had come to provide scientific medical care. He tipped his chin in a gesture that said he wanted her to leave. She held his gaze without a flicker of concern.

Frankie and Margie watched the silent exchange. Then one stepped forward. “Margie Tucker at your service. Mack said you wanted someone to put up a building. This here is my sister, Frankie. She might lend a hand if she can manage to hold up her end.”

He shook hands with the pair. “Appreciate your help.” He glanced toward the last place he’d seen Teena. Only to check that she’d left, he assured himself. She was indeed gone. He glimpsed her heading down the trail leading over the mountain, her graceful gait unmistakable even at this distance. He felt satisfied she had moved on, though somewhat disquieted—only because he’d been rude. Out of necessity, he firmly explained to himself. He turned back to Margie. “I’ve got a young man with me who will assist you.” He would pay Burns to work. Perhaps it would provide incentive for him to stay in Treasure Creek, rather than heading to the gold fields.

“The more the merrier. ’Specially as our younger sister seems more interested in her new husband than in giving us a hand.” Margie’s words growled out, making it sound as if having a husband was worse than having the plague. She turned to Frankie. “Why’d you let her up and marry Caleb anyways?”

Frankie sputtered. “I tried to convince her no Tucker woman needs a man, but you saw how stubborn she was.”

Margie and Frankie rolled their heads and scratched their hairlines in mutual sadness.

Then Margie laughed. “We’ll be glad of your friend’s help. It’ll make the job go faster, too. Now show us what you have in mind, so we can get to work while the sun shines.” She roared with amusement.

Seeing his surprised and somewhat stunned reaction, she patted his shoulder. “My idea of a little joke. In the summer we have no shortage of sun.” She slapped at the mosquitoes. “Nor these little blighters. You get yourself some of that stuff Teena Crow makes up. It helps keep them off.”

“I don’t want her around here.”

The pair gave each other a glance rife with secrets. “You got something against her?” Margie’s voice was soft, but Jacob didn’t miss the warning note.

Not knowing the situation well enough to venture too far, he heeded the warning. “I’m a medical doctor prepared to use my understanding of scientific principles to help people. That woman’s methods are based on superstition and—”

Margie nudged Frankie hard enough to cause her to stumble. “I think our city doctor will soon learn the difference between what matters and what doesn’t. Don’t you think so?”

Frankie guffawed. “There’s those that look only at the outside and judge. Don’t we know that?”

The pair slapped each other on the shoulders and laughed.

Margie grabbed some stakes. “Now, where do you want the building?”

He showed them what he had in mind and helped them stake the corners. When they finished, he went into the tent and nudged Burns from his sleep. Last night, when Jacob offered to pay him, the boy had eagerly agreed to assist with the construction.

“What’s wrong?” Burns mumbled, burrowing deeper into the comfort of his bed.

“I thought you wanted to help.” It was imperative to get the building up as soon as possible.

Burns groaned but made no move to rise.

“I can think of ways to make you get up.” Jacob stood over the boy, remembering the times he’d teased Aaron to get him out of bed. “I used to toss cold water in my brother’s face when he refused to wake.”

Burns squinted through one eye. “You wouldn’t.”

Jacob shrugged. “Not if you get up on your own.”

Burns moaned. “Is it even morning yet?”

“Open your eyes. Daylight is burning.”

A crash of dropped lumber jolted through the small area and Burns’s eyes flew open.

“What is that?”

“That, young man…” he pulled the covers from Burns “…is two women beginning to build the clinic.”

“Women?”

Jacob laughed. “You going to let them put you to shame?”

For one second, Burns looked as if the idea was unacceptable, and then he settled back into the warm furs.

“They’re so eager, let them do it.”

Jacob nudged the boy with the toe of his boot. “Need I get a pitcher of water?” He was more than half-serious. The boy needed to learn responsibility. Maybe if Jacob had been able to have more influence on making Aaron be a man, his brother would still be alive. But his parents had always excused Aaron’s behavior as exuberance. Jacob recognized it for what it was—irresponsibility. “You can choose to be a child and cuddle into your bed, or be a man and do some work.” Words he wished he’d spoken to Aaron when he had the chance. Though, likely, Aaron would have scoffed at him.

Burns sat up and scowled at Jacob. “I’m a man.” He scrambled to his feet and pushed out of the tent.

Relieved the boy had chosen work over sleep, Jacob checked on Donald, gave him some more laudanum then followed Burns outside, smiling when he saw the boy following Margie’s orders and laughing at her teasing.

He walked around the proposed clinic, envisioning the modern facilities. At the corner of the lot he paused and studied the trail up the mountain. It was hard to believe men and women, even children, had scaled it in the midst of winter. He’d seen the upper portion up close, seen the way people had to bend over to keep from falling off. He’d seen, too, the things that suddenly had little importance when they had to be packed on a person’s back up such an incline. So much stuff had been tossed aside that the place looked like a giant dump.

What must the natives think?

And yet Teena seemed eager to help.

Suspicion tugged at the back of his mind. Had she gone up the trail seeking injured people to practice her malarkey on? He thought of asking Margie and Frankie about her, but they had laughed like they shared some secret when he mentioned his concerns about the superstitious ways. Maybe he’d go find out for himself what she was up to.

“I’m going to see if anyone on the trail needs my help.”

Frankie and Margie stopped work. They glanced at each other, then Margie nodded. “Sure. You go do that.” Again, that darted look at her sister and the flicker of a smile between them. Then, as if sensing his curiosity about what they weren’t saying, they bent and picked up some boards.

“I’ll be back later.” As he walked, a hundred questions burned in his brain. What did they know about Teena? Were there other shamans in the area? He had come here for one thing only: to build a clinic and establish adequate medical care. Then he would return to Seattle. Without getting involved in any complications.

Teena stood over the unconscious man. The trail was too rugged, too rocky for her to help him here. The man was too heavy for her to move. She needed help, but a glance to the side, where men and women marched upward, caring only about the promise of gold across the mountains, and she knew she would not find help from them. Mr. McIntyre promised God would never fail her. And the white man in the hut tucked into the trees, who carried the Good Book up and down the trail, reading it to others and praying with them and for them, promised the same thing.

Teena had stopped to visit him on her way up the trail. Thomas Stone was a kind man with a troubled soul. But he loved the Tlingit and the gold seekers equally. Perhaps it was God’s love that made his heart so open to others. Thomas Stone had prayed with her when she told him about Dr. Jacob and her desire to learn the white man’s healing ways. “Pray and trust God to open the door for you,” Thomas Stone said. “God hears your prayers and answers as He deems best.”

Well, if God heard the prayers of a Tlingit woman and did what was best, she could ask Him to send help for this injured man. God, I need to get him where I can care for him. But I can’t move him on my own. Please, send someone to help me.

The stream of gold-hunting humans kept trudging by, unmindful or uncaring about the injured man. She perched on a rock and waited.

“Siteen.” It was her Tlingit name, spoken by her brother. God had sent help, and it was the best help she could ask for. Jimmy was strong as a papa bear. She sprang to her feet and clambered over the rocks to his side.

“I am glad to see you. I need someone to carry this man down the mountain.”

Jimmy hesitated only a moment before he stepped off the trail, dropped to the ground the pack he carried and followed Teena to the injured man. He grunted as he heaved the man across his shoulders, then picked his way over the rocks toward Treasure Creek.

“I thought you would be helping the doctor,” Jimmy said.

“He is not ready.” Let Jimmy decide if she meant the building or something else.

“Remember what Father said. You cannot become a white woman.”

Why did her family have such concerns? She had no desire to leave her native ways. “I only want to learn their healing ways. Besides, who would ever think I could be a white woman? Look at my eyes, my skin, my hair. I am native. Even if I wanted, I could not be anything else.”

Jimmy made a noise in his throat that could be concern or doubt. “I don’t want to see you searching for something that can’t be yours.”

“Do you mean learning from the doctor?” Had he heard Dr. Jacob’s order to stay away?

“That. And more. These people are different than us, though some of their ways are interesting.”

“Like what?”

“Reading. Don’t you wish you could read from their books?”

“Yes. And I would like to read from Thomas Stone’s Bible.” She stopped so suddenly that Jimmy, following her, had to pull up hard.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” She forced her feet to continue onward. She told herself it didn’t matter that Dr. Jacob climbed up the trail, yet her lungs had grown strangely tight and she was again aware of a quickening in the bottom of her heart. He hadn’t yet seen them. Perhaps they could slip by unnoticed.

“I think ‘nothing’ is the doctor. Why do you care so much?”

“Because he is the answer to my prayer to learn their healing ways.”

“Make sure that’s all it is.”

“What more could it be?”

Jimmy sighed. “He is a man, even if he is white. And you are a woman. If you weren’t my sister I would say you are pretty, but I will only admit you aren’t hard to look at. But who knows what the white man sees. How he feels about us.”

She didn’t respond, because she knew what he meant. Whites and natives liked different things, even in what they admired in the looks of each other.

Dr. Jacob glanced up and saw her. Their gazes crashed like waves against the sand during a high wind. Her heart pounded insistently. He was white. He didn’t welcome her presence. Yet she saw nothing in his looks she disliked. It was more than the square shape of his face, the dark mystery of his eyes, the gouge in his chin. It was what she felt—his devotion to helping others, his trueness, his…

She couldn’t explain it, but she knew, she just knew, he was a man who could be trusted, a man who would honor his word, a man who would love deeply.

She jerked her gaze away. Her father had already promised her to a man in the Wolf clan. Even if he hadn’t, Dr. Jacob had already made his opinion of Teena clear, and the very things she admired in him made it impossible for him to change.

Yet he was the answer to her prayers. Somehow she must convince him to let her learn from him.

He stepped off the trail and climbed toward them.

“He is going to help?” Jimmy asked.

“He’s a white doctor.” She didn’t say more. Dr. Jacob seemed to think the Tlingit could offer nothing to a white man’s needs. A white doctor for the white man. Would he also think a native healer for natives? Would he help a native if the need arose?

He reached them, and ignoring Teena, went directly to Jimmy’s side. “Let me examine this man.”

Jimmy stood still but did not lower his burden. “I’m taking him off the mountain.”

“Let me make sure he’s not in danger of bleeding to death.”

Jimmy and Teena exchanged amused looks. As if they would not attend to a wound before they moved the man. But Jimmy waited as Dr. Jacob lifted the man’s eyelids and felt his head, then checked the rest of his body for wounds. He found nothing. Teena could have told him he wouldn’t. She’d located only a lump on the back of the man’s head.

“Could you carry him down to the clinic?”

At least he hadn’t ordered Jimmy to do so. And Jimmy didn’t ask where this clinic was. They all knew Dr. Jacob spoke more from hope than fact.

Jimmy agreed.

Dr. Jacob turned to Teena. “Is this your man?”

Teena giggled. “He is my brother, Jimmy.”

Dr. Jacob nodded, somehow approving her answer, and reached out to shake hands with him.

Jimmy barely touched the man’s outstretched hand then resumed his journey. Teena followed at his heels, Dr. Jacob close behind. She felt him with every breath, every thought. Somehow she had to convince him to teach her. Perhaps this would be her opportunity.

She fell back so she could speak without raising her voice. “You will need someone to watch him. I could do so.” She allowed herself to meet his gaze briefly, before giving her attention back to the rocky path. But it was long enough to see a flash of possibility, and her heart swelled with hope.

“Would you promise not to use any native medicine?” He said the word in such a way she knew it must hurt him to say it.

“I have nothing to help a man who cannot wake up.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

She could not forsake the things she’d learned, the ways of nature that worked. He took her silence for what it was—refusal to agree to his conditions. “We can learn from each other.”

“It cannot be.” He clambered past her and followed on Jimmy’s heels as they picked their way downward and reached the packed level path beside the town. A few minutes later, they reached the crowded lot that had been empty just two days ago.

“Bring him in here.” Dr. Jacob lifted the tent flap. Jimmy ducked inside and lowered the injured man to the fur bedroll.

Teena followed and glanced around. Donald lay on a cot, his color good, his breathing easy. What did the doctor give for pain, if he wouldn’t use the plants and herbs nature provided?

Dr. Jacob knelt beside the man from the trail as Jimmy stepped back. He lifted the eyelids again and pressed his fingers to the man’s wrist.

Teena studied his every move, wondering why he did those things and wishing she dared ask. Perhaps if she remained quiet and motionless he would not notice her presence and give her another of those dismissive looks he’d given her earlier in the day.

Again, he pulled out the thing that fit into his ears and listened to the man’s chest. “He seems fine, except for his unconsciousness.”

Teena pressed back a desire to giggle. She could have told him all that. She sobered. Did he have a way to bring the man awake? All she knew to do was wait for nature to heal him or not.

“I’ll watch him and wait for him to regain consciousness.”

Teena swallowed back her disappointment. It seems the white man had no cure for this, either.

Dr. Jacob glanced at Donald, again pressed his fingers to the inside of the wrist, then he rose to his full height, brushing his head on the top of the tent and faced Jimmy. “Thanks for bringing him here.” His gaze slid past Jimmy to Teena, and his gratitude shifted to disapproval. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes signaled she wasn’t welcome.

Silently, she backed from the tent.

Jimmy followed. “Why are you afraid of him? I thought he was meant to teach you their ways.”

She met his hard gaze without flinching. “He does not know it yet.” But if God could answer her prayer by sending the doctor, God would surely make the man agree to teach her.

Jimmy shook his head and strode back up the trail to retrieve his pack.

The Tucker sisters—the two who had not yet married and had vowed to never do so—nailed together walls for the new clinic. Teena moved closer. “Thought you were supposed to be working on the church. Didn’t Mack decide it was time for a little room on top for a bell?”

Margie paused to answer Teena’s question. “Mack decided this here clinic was more important. He gave us permission to leave the church work for the doctor. We don’t care who pays us to work.”

Frankie didn’t stop adjusting the board, readying it to nail into place. “The doctor’s young friend was helping, but he ran off two minutes after Jacob was out of sight. Ain’t seen him since.” She kicked the board into place. “About as bad as Lucy. Seems to me she runs off at the least little excuse.”

Margie made a noisy sound. “Gotta make a meal for my man.” The way she spoke told Teena she mimicked her sister.

Frankie kicked the board again unnecessarily. “You think the man could make himself a sandwich if he was hungry.”

The pair looked as unhappy as twin bears perched on a beehive.

An idea sprouted and blossomed in Teena’s busy brain. Dr. Jacob had ordered her to stay away from his patients, and he likely also meant the clinic. But the clinic was nothing more than an idea and hope right now. And if she assisted Margie and Frankie…well, surely he would see it was to his benefit. “I could help you.”

Both Frankie and Margie stopped and stood like twin rocks. They stared at her, then shifted and considered each other. Margie turned back to Teena. “You know anything about building?”

“I’ve helped my father.”

Again the sisters silently assessed each other, as if wondering what experience helping her father constituted.

Margie nodded. “I ’spect you can do as well as any man. We accept.”

“Thank you.” She looked about her. What did they want her to do?

Margie didn’t let her wait long to find out. “Grab that board and haul it over here, will you?”

Teena did as instructed, and in a few minutes was wielding a hammer and driving home nails. She giggled softly. Driving them home was perhaps a bit of exaggeration. She missed as often as she hit the nail.

Frankie let out a hearty laugh. “You’ll catch on soon enough. Ain’t nothing a woman can’t learn to do, so far as I can tell.”

Teena grabbed the hammer with both hands and aimed at the nail, giggling when she again missed.

Margie moved to her side. “Hold the hammer like so.” She pulled Teena’s hand lower on the handle. “Swing with your arm.”

Teena did as instructed and soon had the nail in place. “There.”

Margie chuckled. “You’ll do just fine.”

Teena felt Dr. Jacob’s presence, and without turning, knew he had stepped from the tent. All the while she banged on the nail she’d been acutely aware of him. Between blows to the wood, she heard his murmurs as he dealt with the two injured men. But she dared not tiptoe closer to listen.

“Margie,” he called, his voice soft but insistent. “May I speak to you?” He tipped his head toward the other side of the tent, indicating she should join him there.

Margie didn’t move. “Ain’t nothing you need to say in private.”

Dr. Jacob considered the three women, then nodded. “Very well.” He cleared his throat. “I’m a medical doctor—”

“Yeah. We know.”

He went on as if Margie hadn’t interrupted him. “I believe in science. Superstition is not only ignorant but harmful.”

Teena knew he meant her. Nevertheless, she stood her ground. Whether or not he liked it, and even if he denied it and fought against it, she was determined to learn his ways of healing. If that meant learning to hammer a nail and build a white man’s house, she would do that, too. But she would not give up.

Margie and Frankie now stood side by side. “Say what you mean, Doc.” It was obvious Margie spoke for both of them.

“I told you, I don’t want a shaman near my patients.”

Margie and Frankie dropped their tools and looked about ready to get mad.

Teena started to back away.

“You’re not leaving.” Margie’s words stopped Teena’s intended escape. Margie hadn’t shifted her gaze from Dr. Jacob. “Seems to me, if you’re interested in getting this here clinic built in a timely fashion, you can’t be so all-fired concerned about who does the work. So long as it’s getting done.” Although her voice was low, Teena knew it held a load of anger.

She didn’t dare breathe, feeling as if her life hung in the weight of Margie’s deceptively soft words. Neither Margie nor Frankie moved, awaiting Dr. Jacob’s decision. Teena knew the Tucker sisters well enough to know they would leave in the blink of an eye if Dr. Jacob pushed them the wrong way.

She watched the doctor as he assessed the sisters, knew he understood their silent ultimatum and was considering how to best deal with it.

When Jacob sucked in air like a drowning man rescued from the waters, she knew he realized his limited options. “I have no problem with her helping you.”

He gently emphasized the word you, making it clear she could help them but not him. His words clawed into the secret depths of her heart.

Ignoring the way her eyes stung, she picked up another nail and pounded it into place. When she finished and glanced to where Dr. Jacob had stood, he was gone, and Margie and Frankie were busy measuring a board.