September Wind (40 page)

             
An elderly man cracked the door. “A girl’s been hurt,” Paul blared. “She needs a doctor, right away.”

             
When the man saw Emily, he swung the door open. “Bring her in,” he said. “I’ll call an ambulance.” He turned and hobbled over to a small table and pulled a phonebook from a drawer. Paul looked nervously out across the road and then stepped through the doorway just as a woman came up the hallway.

             
“
Oh, what do we have here?” She made her way over, peeked at Emily, then up at Paul. “I’ll get something for that cut. Sid, maybe you’d better run them to the hospital.”

When she returned a minute later, the men were already heading for the car, Emily still cradled in Paul’s arms. She caught up with them and placed a wet washcloth across Emily’s head, touching her arm. “Be careful. I think it’s broken.”

The ride to Saint Mary’s General Hospital in San Francisco was frantic. “Never mind the speed limit. Just go,” Paul said from the back seat whenever the old man slowed.

             
At the hospital, Doctor Barnes tended to Emily, and then walked out into the corridor, still writing in the patient chart. He stopped to read some notes then looked up at Paul. “So you’re the man that brought her in?”

             
Paul nodded. “Yes, I am.”

             
“
Are you a relative?”

             
“
I’m the stableman where she works.”

             
“
Any relatives nearby?”

             
“
Uhm… yes, yes. I’ll have to let you know on that.”

“Okay. And, are you going to be around for a while?”

              “
Yes, of course. I’ll be here for as long as I’m needed.”

             
“
Good, because I’m going to send someone to talk to you about the circumstances surrounding her accident.”

             
“
She’ll be okay, won’t she?”

             
The doctor handed the chart to a nurse and turned back to Paul. “Well, our main concern is the head injury. But we’re going to watch it closely, and with lots of rest and good care, I believe she’ll come out of it just fine. She’s been in and out of consciousness since you brought her in, although we gave her some medication that should keep her out for a while. We do that because the less trauma to her head, the faster the healing. Other than that, she has a broken arm and a number of bumps and bruises.”

             
“
I had to take her a ways on horseback, but I was very careful to hold her in a way that would limit movement. You think... you think it might’ve hurt her?”

             
“
Well, I don’t think it helped, but it doesn’t seem to have done any lasting damage either.”

             
“
That’s a relief.”

             
The doctor looked at his watch. “I have to go. But she should be in her room by now. She’s in two-fourteen. I’ll stop by later to check on her. Oh, and you have your I.D. I hope, because just to be on the safe side, we’re keeping a guard at her door until this is cleared up.”

             
When Paul walked into her room, he found Emily lying amongst a mound of pillows and blankets with her head wrapped, and an arm in a cast resting on a pillow. A nurse adjusted the IV and took a thermometer from under her tongue. “How’s she doing?” he asked.

             
The nurse looked at the numbers on the thermometer and began writing in the chart. “I don’t think she’ll do much moving around for a while. But her temperature is just a few points over, and her blood pressure and pulse are what’s expected, for what she’s been through anyway.”

             
“
That’s good to know,” he said. He waited until the nurse tucked in the covers and left, and then he went to stand beside her bed.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

A young doctor entered the second floor nurses’ station to make patient reviews. There was something familiar about a purse lying on the counter, although he didn’t pay much attention to it as he moved it aside to make room for a chart. When something slid from the bag onto the table, he reached over and picked it up.

              “
Iris, where’d this blue bag come from?” He set the chart aside and gaped at the unforgettable picture on the notebook.

             
The nurse poked her head around the corner. “Oh that. That’s the girl’s in two-fourteen. Some elderly man dropped it off, said it was left in his car when he brought her in. Poor girl had a bad fall. Doctor? Is everything okay?”

             
“
I’m not sure.” He stuffed the notebook back into the purse, and then turned up the corridor.

             
A minute later, he entered two-fourteen and went to Emily’s side. He lowered the bed-rail then glanced over at Paul. “How’s she doing?”

             
Paul pulled himself from the chair. “From what I’ve been told, she’s going to make it.”

             
The doctor checked her pupils, felt her pulse, and listened to her heart, then set the stethoscope aside, and lifted the railing. “I’m Doctor Michael Foster. I met Emily on the train a year or so back. Say, she mentioned something about wanting to find an old friend of her mother’s. Was that you?”

Paul looked at Emily, then back to the doctor. “Yes, it was me. She was looking for me. I’m Samuel Dimsmoore, that friend of her mother’s.”

              “
Wow. Samuel Dimsmoore. You have no idea how many times I wished I’d asked her what your name was. I had no way of contacting her to make sure she found you okay.”

             
You would’ve needed my uncle’s Post Office box number because I haven’t lived in San Francisco for fourteen years. Thank God Emily had his address, although she had no way of knowing I didn’t live here in town.”

“
But then you did find her.”

“That’s right. She’s… well, she was working as a nanny.”

              Michael looked down at her bandaged head. “How did she fall?”

             
“
Let me just say that the accident is under investigation. Now, what led up to the fall I don’t know, except that early this morning she came barreling out of the woods, jumped on her horse and took off like a scared rabbit. Not long after, I saw a man come from the same area and run up to the boss’s quarters. I thought about it a little too long though, and by the time I got to the house, she was lying at the bottom of the steps.”

             
“
Oh, dear.” Michael stood, shaking his head. “So this is the reason for the guard outside the door.”

             
Samuel nodded. “I didn’t see it happen, but it didn’t look good, him standing there staring down at her.”

             
“
Him?”

             
“
Yes, Donald Schillings. That was her boss.”

             
“
Mm, Schillings, that name does sound familiar. Well... this is just unbelievable.”

             
“
I agree. If only I…”

             
Michael looked across the bed to where Samuel was fighting tears. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

Samuel stepped back, took a seat, and Michael moved around to the other side of the bed.

              “
I guess the best place for me to start is when I received a letter from Emily a while back asking me to meet her at a place called Mack’s House of Food. She gave three dates just in case I didn’t make the first two.”

             
“
But you did eventually meet her at the restaurant?”

             
“
No, she never showed up. I didn’t get the letter soon enough to meet her the first time. But the minute I got it, I went over and tried my best to find out where she was.”

             
“
But then you found her, right?”

             
“
Eventually. Everything pointed to one waitress, although she wouldn’t admit to knowing a thing. Then when Emily didn’t show up on that second date, I confronted the waitresses again,
nothing. When she didn’t show on the third date, I finally managed to pry it out of the woman that she had taken her to a... well… to a brothel.”

Michael looked aghast. “You can’t be serious.”

              “
Yes, I’m afraid so. Although she didn’t stay long.”

             
“
You say she was a nanny.”

             
“
Yes, she left the brothel to become a nanny. I talked the waitress into confessing she knew where she was. Well... I didn’t actually talk her into it. I bugged her until she got so frustrated with me that she let it slip.” Samuel sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Anyway, I showed up as she was leaving work one afternoon with bribe money I got from selling my pickup. I wanted to know where the brothel was. When she told me Emily had moved to Schillings, I gave her the money. But as the bus was coming up the street, the waitress gave me payback for bullying her. I’ll admit I was a little tough on her. But she asked for it.”

             
“
And the payback was...”

“I can’t remember the exact words she used, but it was something like,
well if you think you’re so tough, how about this
, and then she went on to say that Emily called the restaurant while I was sitting there waiting for her, but after she described me to her, she said she didn’t want to meet me.”

“And that was because of…”

              “
Because of my color.”

             
“
That doesn’t sound like the person I met on the train.”

             
“
Hey, I know what you mean. At first I didn’t want to believe the waitress myself, but…” Samuel tapped his fingers on the arm of the chair, shaking his head. “You have to have known her grandfather to understand. And by the look on Emily’s face when I showed up at Schillings, and by the way she reacted toward me, it was obvious the old guy had enormous influence on her.”

             
“
I’m a little confused. You went over and saw her, left her there, and then returned at some point and found her at the bottom of the stairs?”

             
“
No, I went there and stayed, knowing if I needed to, I’d drag her away and reap the consequences later. After what the waitress told me, I couldn’t just come out and tell her who I was and take the chance of her barring me from the place, and from her life. I wanted to give her a chance to have a new perspective, mainly on whatever values her grandfather thrust on her.”

             
Samuel sat for a few moments staring at Emily. “The children and I got along like gold, but Emily and I had our moments. Me with my impatience, and her with, well, sometimes she had an attitude. Although... I have to admit, I probably came across as irritated with her most of the time, brash may be a better word. But that was only because I thought she was being reckless. I almost told her I was Samuel a number of times, but that didn’t pan out. I know she was expecting someone a lot whiter than I am. Anyway... you must understand my dilemma.”

             
“
Yes, I guess I do. And that was very nice of you to take such interest in her.”

             
“
Well, as I said, her mother and I were friends. And that’s something I don’t take lightly.”

             
“
So then… how were you able to set yourself up at Schillings?”

             
“
Luckily I had contact with a man who was able to recommend me for hire as a stableman. At the time, I thought Schillings had rescued Emily from the Palace. He was very friendly to me, but still I was concerned and suspicious about his ties with the brothel. That, and a few other matters. You know, I talked to one of the housekeepers... Gabriel was her name. She zipped her mouth about her boss, and told me she didn’t know anything about Emily except that she was always getting into one fix or another.”

             
“
Now that doesn’t sound like her, either.”

             
“
I’m beginning to think that it does,” Samuel corrected him. “I have a feeling she’s used to living on the edge. Finding herself at the Palace, and then at Donald Schillings is proof of that. You know, sometimes when a person finds their life in ruins, it becomes like a vicious circle they can’t get out of. I think that’s what happened to her. She was probably acting on instinct to protect herself, just trying to get through each day.”

             
Michael considered for a moment. “Yes, you’re probably right about that.”

             
Footsteps came up the hallway, and the men turned as Doctor Barnes walked in.

             
“
Doctor Foster. Hello,” the older doctor said, clearly surprised to see him. He glanced at Samuel, then back to Michael. “You two know each other?”

             
“
Not until I came to see Emily.”

             
“
So you’re a friend of Emily’s?”

             
“
We spent a night together on the train.” Michael’s face turned red. “Now that didn’t sound right. Let me explain.”

             
Doctor Barnes let the rail down and smiled at Michael. “There’s no need to explain. I know you well enough that none is needed. It’s nice to know you’re here to check on her.”