Calder Brand - Janet Dailey Page 0,31
was gone, she faced a long period of trying and waiting. Even if she managed to get accepted, the process could take months. Meanwhile, she needed a plan to survive.
Selling the house wouldn’t make sense until she had her acceptance, especially given the letters and paperwork that would need to go back and forth with every application. She would stay here through the winter. By spring, if all went according to her best hopes, she would be ready to sell the house and begin her new life as a medical student.
Meanwhile, she would need to make a living. She wasn’t a real doctor, but she knew how to deliver babies, set broken bones, stitch up wounds, and treat fevers. With no other doctor practicing in Ogallala, she would still be needed, and hopefully paid.
Rising from her chair, she walked back into her great-uncle’s bedroom. Lifting his cold hand in hers, she pressed it to her lips. As the loss became real, tears welled in her eyes and trickled down her cheeks.
“Thank you for giving me my chance, Uncle Harlan,” she whispered. “I’ll do everything I can to make you proud.”
Turning away, she tied on her bonnet, squared her shoulders, and left the house to fetch the undertaker.
* * *
The doctor was laid to rest two days later. The graveside service was a simple one, as he’d requested, but a good number of townspeople turned out to pay their respects and to offer Sarah their condolences, including her young friend, Ezra, and his grandfather, the stationmaster.
When the grave was filled in, Sarah laid a bouquet of autumn daisies and sunflowers on the sad mound of earth and went home to an empty house. She was footsore from standing and wrung out from the sad farewell to a good man she’d come to love. His presence seemed to linger in every room—his instruments in the surgery, his clothes and shoes in the closet, his books beside hers on the shelves, his favorite blue coffee cup on the kitchen counter.
Tomorrow she would roll up her sleeves and try to make the place seem more like her own. For now, all she wanted to do was rest.
Sinking into the rocker that faced the empty fireplace, Sarah leaned back and closed her eyes. She’d begun to doze when she was startled by a sharp rap at the front door.
Forcing herself to her feet, she smoothed the skirt of her black mourning dress and hurried to answer the knock. Maybe someone needed her help.
She opened the door to find two people standing on the porch. One was a small man with a narrow ferret’s face, wearing a tobacco brown suit and carrying a briefcase. Slightly behind him stood a tall, stunning brunette wearing a blue-gray traveling suit with white gloves and a chic matching hat. Neither of them was smiling.
Sarah found her voice. “Can I help you?” she asked.
“Allow me to introduce myself,” the small man said. “I’m Phillip Roxberry, attorney-at-law. This”—he nodded toward the woman behind him—“is my client, Mrs. Lenore Blake, widow of the late Dr. Harlan Blake. We’ve come with legal documents in hand, supporting Mrs. Blake’s claim to her late husband’s property.”
Dumbfounded, Sarah stared at them. “I don’t understand. I thought—”
“It’s like this, honey.” The woman’s voice and manner belied her elegant appearance. “I never signed any divorce papers, so the marriage is still legal. As Harlan’s widow, this house is mine. So get packing, and make sure you don’t take any valuables—believe me, we’ll check. You’ve got twenty-four hours.”
* * *
After an hour of sprinting, ducking, and scanning the empty horizon behind him, Joe allowed himself to feel hopeful. Maybe he wasn’t being trailed. Maybe he’d gotten away clean.
Using the skills he’d honed as a scout for the McCracken gang, he’d cut a zigzag course, doubling back in some places, and keeping to short grass and bare rock where he could find it. An expert tracker might still be able to follow him, but the vigilantes struck him as nothing more than a bunch of riled-up cowboys, out to kill off a nest of rustlers. A lawful posse would have arrested Ambrose for trial, not shot down an unarmed man in his underwear.
He couldn’t help hoping that Clem and Slinger would get away. They might be outlaws, but they’d treated him decently. They deserved better than the bloody, brutal death they would suffer if they were caught. As for their father’s hidden money stash, it was probably gone for good—either burned