Fletcher's Woman (45 page)

Field grasped his arm and ushered him toward the large mess tent standing in the middle of the small community. “Up until now,” he hissed, as they sat down at one of the long wooden tables inside to drink Chang's abominable coffee, “I would have sworn you had sense enough to come in out of the rain!”

Griffin tried for a smile, managed a grimace. “Relax, Field. Doctors don't get sick.”

Overhead, the rain hammered at the taut canvas roof. “You might. Griffin, you look like hell—when was the last time you slept?”

He sipped the coffee, cursed in irritation, and reached for a crockery pitcher of cream. A generous measure turned the fierce brew to a sandalwood color and disguised its bitterness a little. “I don't sleep, Field. It's a waste of time.”

“You're just going to keep moving until you collapse?” Field bit out, stirring his own coffee with such force that the spoon rattled against the sides of the enamel cup.

Griffin met the angry, turquoise eyes with a frown. “The last time I collapsed, old friend, it was because you and your cronies chloroformed me. Now, while we haven't had a chance to discuss that, the fact remains that I don't appreciate it.”

Field's gaze was still direct, still full of challenge. “I didn't think you would,” he said. “And I don't really care. Do you think there's going to be an epidemic?”

The coffee curdled on Griffin's tongue, and he resisted an innate need to spew it onto the sawdust floor. His aching shoulders moved in a weary shrug. “It's possible. This place breeds disease—it's a wonder there hasn't been typhoid or cholera already.”

The reverend paled slightly. “Well, something has got to be done!”

Again, Griffin shrugged. “Tell that to Jonas, my friend. Those wet tents and open sewers are his province, not mine.”

Exasperated, Field forced down three or four gulps of his coffee. “Maybe so, but the patients are yours, Griffin.”

“You don't honestly think I ever forget that, do you?” Griffin asked evenly. “By the way, what were you grinning about, back there in the Larson's tent?”

“Rachel,” Field replied, and the smile was back in his eyes again, though it looked a bit tarnished now.

The name prodded a shifting core of pain inside Griffin, lent a gruff note to his voice. “What about her?”

“I can't believe it—you really haven't heard!”

Griffin glared at his friend.
“What about her?”
he demanded.

Field laughed. “She backed Jonas Wilkes down, Griffin—with a little help from Mamie and her ‘oyster gun.'”

Griffin was all attention. “What?”

“She's closed down Becky's Place, Griffin. Tomorrow it opens as McKinnon's Rooming House.”

Impatient, Griffin waved away this news and insisted. “Never mind the rooming house—what's this about Jonas and Mamie and a gun?”

There was a grin—a real one—twitching at the comer of Field's mouth. “The way Mamie told it, Jonas came into that saloon roaring like a lion and demanded that Rachel pack her things and leave with him.” He paused, held up both hands when he saw the fury in Griffin's face. “Now, let me finish, will you? Rachel declined, none too politely, and they had words. Griffin, she must have pushed Jonas right over the edge—he spanked her.”

While the thought of Jonas touching Rachel in any way stirred murderous things inside Griffin, he couldn't help grinning at the picture that sprang into his mind. “And I thought he was all bad,” he said.

Field laughed, his hands cupped around his empty coffee mug. “There's more. Mamie got out that shotgun she claims she keeps around in case any oysters decide to rush the place, and she pointed it at Jonas's head. At which time, he deemed it advisable to quit blistering Rachel. Only he didn't leave soon enough to suit Mamie, so she fired a warning shot and hit that mirror Becky had shipped in from San Francisco.”

“Damn,” Griffin muttered, too tired to laugh. His eyes scanned Field's face, knowing it well, seeing the serious look behind his grin. “What is it that you're not telling me?”

“Mamie got the impression that Jonas meant to kill somebody
if Rachel didn't appear at his front door within twenty-four hours.”

Griffin shot to his feet so quickly that the bench he'd been sitting on fell sideways, onto the sawdust floor. “Damn that son of a bitch, I'll—”

Field was shaking his head resolutely. “Sit down, Griffin. Now.”

“That—”

“Listen to me! Jonas backed off, and I think you should, too. If you don't make any trouble, chances are, he won't.”

Griffin barely heard his friend's reasoning. He was too busy thinking what a fool he'd made of himself, how stupid he'd been to believe Rachel when she'd said she didn't love him. Twice, her body had told him eloquently that she did.

He clasped the edges of the table with both hands and swore. Molly had been right; Rachel was trying to protect him. And he had a suspicion that she would have gone to Jonas's house if she'd had to, just to save his hide.

“You say Jonas backed down. What accounts for that?”

Field frowned. “Who knows? My guess would be that he regretted showing his true colors the way he did.”

Griffin whirled suddenly, abandoning his friend, his coffee, the overturned bench. Outside, the rain was hammering at the ground, as if to wash the world clean of evils like Tent Town.

He ran, coatless, unconcerned with appearances, until he reached the locked doors of Becky's Place. Drenched to the skin, breathing hard from the exertion, he raised both fists and pounded at the doors until one of them creaked open.

And Rachel was standing there, her orchid eyes wide, her chin high.

“You lied!” he said, jubilantly. “You thought Jonas would kill me if you married me, and
you lied!”

Her lower lip quivered. “I still believe that he would, Griffin Fletcher. And nothing on earth could make me take the chance.”

He reached for her cautiously, his hands resting on her shoulders. “There's only one problem with your reasoning, Sprite. I can handle Jonas.”

One tear trickled down Rachel's cheek, and she shook her head. “No. Jonas isn't straightforward like you, Griffin. He would ambush you—attack when you weren't expecting it, just like he did in Seattle, in the O'Rileys' garden.”

“All right,” Griffin conceded, “Maybe he would. He usually does things that way. I know this: I'd rather take my chances than live without you.”

Rachel let her face rest, tear dampened, against one of his hands. “I love you, Griffin Fletcher. But I won't marry you until I know I won't end up a widow, the way Molly Brady did.”

At that point in time, Griffin was willing to agree to almost anything. He sighed. “I've got to get back to my rounds, Sprite. Will you just do me one favor?”

Rachel smiled uncertainly. “What?”

“Stop worrying about what Jonas might do to me. Everything is going to be all right.”

She didn't look the least bit convinced, but Griffin didn't care. She loved him, and for now, that was all that mattered. He bent, kissed her lightly, and turned to go.

Rachel caught his arm. “Griffin?”

“What?” he asked, turning back just in time to see an ominous shadow loom in her eyes and then fade away again.

Splotches of crimson gathered on her fine cheekbones, and she looked away. “It's nothing—really. C-Could you come to supper tonight, and bring Molly and Billy, too?”

Something primal and cryptic convulsed within Griffin, and he knew only that the feeling had nothing to do with anything so mundane as supper. What was that odd, writhing darkness he had seen in her eyes? “Rachel—”

But she was gone, suddenly, closing the saloon doors behind her. “Seven o'clock!” she called, through the glass and wood, a kind of stricken cheer ringing in her voice.

Griffin walked slowly back to Tent Town, oblivious to the rain, the wagons grinding through the thickening mud, and the beautiful, silvery-haired woman who watched him from the porch of Judge Sheridan's house.

•   •   •

Athena would have preferred to stay with Jonas, just as she had the night before, but she didn't dare. Heaven knew, if word got back to Griffin that she'd slept beneath that particular roof, any chance of reaching him would be gone.

She sighed, raising one of Clovis's gold-trimmed china teacups to her lips as she watched Griffin walking through the rain.
I love you
, she called after him, in aching silence.

But then, just as Athena was certain that she'd have to bolt from the Sheridan's porch and run after Griffin Fletcher like a hussy, Clovis appeared. As usual, she was far too observant.

“I honestly don't know what you see in that rude, tiresome young man, Athena,” she piped, some private outrage snapping in her eyes. “Why, if you'd seen how he ruined poor Mr. Wilke's beautiful wedding, and the frightful thing he did in church—”

Athena's interest rose. She'd heard Jonas's grudging account of the aborted wedding ceremony, but the church episode was something new. “What happened—in church, I mean?”

Clovis shuddered at the memory. “Naturally, we were all upset that Field Hollister took an Indian for a bride—he'd gotten my Ruby's hopes up, you know—and I, for one, wanted to let him know what I thought.”

“Would you believe it, Griffin Fletcher came marching up that aisle—as if he ever set foot in a church willingly—with a bundle of rocks! Mind you, he thrust one of those boulders at me and said, ‘Clovis, cast the first stone.'”

Athena affected a cough, so that she could cover her mouth with one hand.

Clovis, having raised four daughters, was not fooled by the tactic. “Laugh if you will, but if there's anybody in this town more downright sinful than Griffin Fletcher, I'd like to know about it!”

“Sinful?” Athena managed, swallowing hard. “
Griffin
?”

Clovis nodded smartly. “He's been courting one of those Tent Town women, Athena. And she's Becky McKinnon's daughter in the bargain!”

He's been doing more than courting,
Athena thought, and suddenly, it wasn't difficult at all to keep from smiling. In fact, she completely lost patience. “Oh, Clovis, don't be so dreary. You're just peeved because he didn't marry one of your daughters!”

Clovis flushed bright red and sputtered, “Athena, that was an impertinent thing to say! Is that the way ladies talk in France?”

Athena reminded herself that there were no hotels in Providence and softened her tone, in an attempt to mollify her hostess. “No,” she said. “It's not the way ladies talk anywhere. I'm sorry.”

Pleased, Clovis patted her hand. “Never you mind, dear. Never you mind. And if you want Griffin Fletcher's attentions, there is only one thing to do. We'll have a party!”

The prospect was not heartening. “Griffin hates parties,” Athena mourned.
He probably couldn't be dragged away from those shabby tents, anyway,
she added in her mind.

Clovis shrugged, and once again, there was a flash of petulance in her eyes. “He hasn't attended a single one of mine,” she admitted. But then her face brightened suddenly, and she chirped. “You must get sick!”

A smile curved Athena's full lips. Lord knew, pestilence was the one thing Griffin couldn't resist. “I do feel a little ill,” she said.

Within thirty minutes, Athena was ensconced in Clovis's guest room bed, looking very ill indeed.

•   •   •

Grumbling, Griffin pulled his watch from his vest pocket and glared at it. It was nearly six-thirty, and he hadn't even had a chance to mention Rachel's supper invitation to Molly.

He squared his shoulders. Well, he would see what was wrong at the Sheridan place and then go home and change clothes. With luck, he could still be at Rachel's before seven.

The rain that had braced him before was little more than an annoyance now. Griffin strode through it, irritated, wondering which one of Clovis's daughters had eaten herself into a stupor this time.

By the time he pounded at the front door of Judge Sheridan's house, his mood was downright foul. “What is it?” he snapped, when Clovis admitted him.

Her chin quivered a little, and Griffin noted, with amusement, that she hadn't forgiven him for his last visit to this house, during Jonas's “wedding,” or for the scene he'd created with the stones after Field had announced his marriage.

“Our houseguest,” she said stiffly, “is suffering some affliction.”

Griffin rubbed his eyes with the index finger and thumb of his left hand and sighed. “Lead the way, Clovis. I don't have all night.”

The judge's wife gave him a sullen look and gestured toward the stairway. “In the guest room,
Dr.
Fletcher—where my Ruby was when His Honor had to summon you that night.”

Griffin remembered, and he suppressed a grin as he moved toward the stairs. There had been a memorable fuss that snowy winter night; Clovis and the Judge had rousted him out of bed at an hour unconscionable even for a country doctor, convinced that their thirty-two-year-old “child” was dying a hideous death. In actuality, Griffin discovered, Ruby had consumed two dried apple pies all by herself and needed nothing more than a lecture and a cathartic.

He was still smiling when he rapped at the door of the upstairs bedroom.

“Come in, Doctor,” said a tremulous voice—a disturbingly familiar voice.

Griffin obeyed, stopped cold when he saw Athena peering at him over the edge of a blue satin comforter. There was a decidedly healthy glint in the wide indigo eyes, and the room lacked the subtle smell that marked genuine illness.

“You,” he said flatly.

Athena batted her thick eyelashes. “Well, I
am
sick, Griffin,” she insisted, a sort of peevish mischief sounding in her voice.