Home by Morning (8 page)

No one spoke, and the silence fired her temper. “
Will no one help this boy?”

“I will.”

Jess whirled and saw Cole standing on the other side of the screen door behind her. He pulled it open and stepped into the saloon. The whole place seemed to sizzle with his presence, and she caught a brief whiff of leather and hay that overrode the typical saloon smells.

“I came to get the old man,” he said, nodding at his father. “But I imagine he’ll keep until we get Cookson taken care of. I’ve got the truck outside. I just have to take Amy home first.”

Glancing beyond his shoulder, she saw her sister sitting in the front seat of the Ford parked next to the sidewalk. As much as she wished to avoid him, Jess couldn’t refuse his help. He was the only one who had offered. “Thank you, Cole.”

But he wasn’t looking at her. His hard gaze was fixed on the group in Tilly’s. “I’ll meet you back at the office,” he said at last, then turned and walked outside.

Before she left she frowned at them, too.

“I’m ashamed of all of you.”

Cole jammed the truck into first gear and made a wide U-turn to take Amy to Mrs. Donaldson’s.

“Was that
Jessica
I saw storming out of Tilly’s?” Amy asked, aghast. “What on earth was she doing in the saloon?”

His chuckle was on the grim side. “Making those guys look like jackasses. She walked down here to ask someone to help Eddie Cookson. He’s sick and needs a ride home. No one would do it.”

Amy gripped the edge of the seat as they bumped over a wheel rut and clutched her hat with her free hand. “Sick—with what?”

“Jess says it’s influenza, and none of those men would help.”

“Good heavens, why not?”

Cole had stood on Tilly’s porch long enough to witness the main part of the confrontation. “They don’t want to catch it.”

“That’s—it’s unpatriotic.”

He told her what he’d overheard.

“The plague! That’s not possible, is it?”

“I don’t know—your sister said no. Of course, now that story will probably be all over town by morning. You know how those guys spread gossip. They’re worse than a bunch of old women.”

“But—but how could they refuse to help? Eddie is a U.S. Army infantryman, a soldier.” He caught her outraged expression from the corner of his eye. “We gave him a parade,” she added, as if that said everything.

“That’s basically what Jess told them, only she was more direct. That’s her—high-minded, outraged, plainspoken.” Yeah, that was his Jess. Then he reined in the thought. She wasn’t his anymore. She had seen to that.

“Now what’s going to happen? And what about your father?”

“Pop can cool his heels in the saloon for a while. He won’t care. I’m going to drive you home, then go back for Eddie.”

“You see, Cole? You
are
a hero.” She hugged his arm, making him pull the wheel toward the right. “If you’d gone off to France, who would be here to do this good deed?”

Yeah, a hero, he mulled sourly, straightening the wheel as they chugged down quiet Russell Street, with its rows of tidy homes and fenced yards. He didn’t feel like much of a hero.

He pulled up in front of Mrs. Donaldson’s neat, two-story house. Through one window, he could see the woman setting the dining room table. “Looks like I got you home in time for dinner.”

“It’s been such a busy day, I’m just going to have a little bite to eat and put my feet up.”

He jumped out of the truck and came around to help her out. In the cool, pale twilight they walked up to Mrs. Donaldson’s porch. He saw the older woman retreat to the other side of the front door. He just knew she was standing there with her ear pressed against the panel, listening.

“She’s spying on us again,” Cole said in a low voice.

“Shh! I think she’s just a romantic at heart,” Amy whispered, smiling. “She’s never really gotten over losing Mr. Donaldson.”

Cole snorted in derision. “Donaldson died twenty years ago.” He was more inclined to believe the old lady was just a nosy snoop, but he didn’t say so. He knew that Amy was fond of her. He took Amy’s gloved hands in his and gave her a chaste peck on the cheek.

“Thank you for helping Jessica.”

He wanted to say that he wasn’t helping her. He was helping Eddie. But that would have only created a tense moment. And he wasn’t sure it was true. He shrugged. “What else can I do? I’d like to think that someone would give me a ride if I was too sick to walk.”

“And that’s why you’re my hero.” She gazed up at him shyly.

He cringed at the notion of being anyone’s hero.

She gave him a searching look, her own expression uncertain. “Cole, is everything—well, is there anything you want to talk about?”

“Me? No, why?”

“Lately I’ve had the feeling that something is troubling you. Something we should discuss.” She gazed at him as if she were trying to read his thoughts. The scrutiny made his throat tight, and he looked away.

He kissed her cheek. “You worry too much.” He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, trying to squelch the hollow feeling in the pit of his soul. “Everything is fine. Or at least as fine as it can be, considering. You go in. I’ve got to get Eddie Cookson home. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“Well, if you’re certain—”

He made a shooing gesture at her.

She smiled then, apparently reassured, and pushed open the front door. Mrs. Donaldson let out a loud squawk and Cole caught a glimpse of her holding her nose.

“Mrs. Donaldson!” Amy exclaimed. “Oh, dear, are you all right? Here, take my handkerchief. The bleeding will stop—”

He jumped down the stairs two at a time, and with colossal self-control, didn’t laugh until he was back in the truck.

Jessica was waiting for Cole on the sidewalk when he pulled up in front of her office. He recognized her expression. He saw worry in her face, and she looked tired.

“He’s ready to go?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know, Cole. I’m beginning to think I should keep Eddie here in one of the patient beds. He’s doing so poorly. He has a high fever and he’s becoming delirious.”

He shut off the engine and got out of the Ford. “Can you cure him?”

“No. There’s no cure for influenza. The body has to heal itself.” She paced a short path, back and forth, her arms folded over her chest. She was talking to him, but it seemed as if she was outlining a course of action to herself as well. “I can make sure he gets his medication every two hours. Beyond that, there’s not much I can provide except good nursing. But I’d like to keep an eye on him. If an emergency comes up, someone would have to bring him into town again. That is, if the crisis was even recognized. I don’t think he should be shuttled around like that.” She told him about Eddie wandering for hours without ever getting home.

Just then, a crash came from the waiting room. They ran inside and found Eddie Cookson collapsed on the floor. In the fall, he’d overturned his chair and a wrought-iron coat tree, which had cut a gash in the oak flooring.

“Jesus,” Cole uttered. The change in Eddie’s appearance was almost unbelievable. This was not the boy-soldier who’d smiled and waved from his parade float earlier in the day. Or even the one Cole had helped carry over here earlier. This young man looked as if he’d already been through the war—and lost. His eyes were inflamed, his face was the color of one of Shaw’s old red bandanas, and he was shivering like a wet dog left out in the snow.

Jess grasped his wrist. “His heart is galloping.”

Eddie looked up at Jessica with bleary, unfocused eyes. “Mother? Can you make the hammer stop banging in my head? It—” His rambling was interrupted by another bout of coughing.

“I’ve got to get him upstairs and into bed.”

Cole nodded. This was just plain bad. “Come on, Ed. We’ll get you fixed up.” He hoisted Eddie to his feet. Between the two of them, they practically dragged him up the stairs to the patient room situated across the hall from Jess’s own apartment. Cole lowered Eddie to one of the narrow iron beds while Jessica looked in the cabinet that stood in one corner.

“I don’t know if I have gowns or pajamas in here.” She rummaged through sheets, bedding, and other linens. “Aha! Here they are.” They managed to wrestle their patient out of his hot wool uniform and into a pair of white cotton pajamas. All the while, Eddie coughed and mumbled in a disjointed ramble, complaining about the bone-deep pain that had overtaken his body.

Cole had never seen anything like it. Judging by the expression on Jessica’s face, he wasn’t sure she had, either.

Once they had him in the bed, Jess forced a pill down Eddie’s throat. Her hair had come loose from its pins, and blond tendrils hung around her face. “The morphine should help the cough and aches.”

“What else can you do for him?” Cole asked, and sat on the empty bed in the room.

“I’ll examine him to try to figure out just which systems are involved.” She glanced up at him. “I mean how much of his body is affected. Do the Cooksons have a telephone?”

“I don’t know. We do at the farm since we’re on a main road, but Birdeen only works days, so there’s no one to put the call through. There’s been talk about getting a night operator, but it hasn’t happened.”

She pushed her straggling hair out of her face. “All right. If you could get word to his family that he’s here, it would be a big help.” Her words were fractured by Eddie’s hacking, Watching him, her expression took on a pale look of dawning horror.

“What?”

“Oh, God…” She stared at the shivering, muttering man in the bed.

“
What?
What’s the matter?”

She told him about her conversation with Leroy Fenton and the telegram she’d received. “I was going to leave for Seattle on Saturday’s train. I supposed Powell Springs would survive until Pearson gets here. But if this epidemic is as contagious as it sounds—Cole, this boy probably talked to nearly every person in town in the past two days. Who knows how many people were exposed? Who he shook hands with, breathed on? The children and the older folks around here will be coming down with it too.”

“So all those men down at Tilly’s who didn’t want to help—”

“They might get sick anyway, along with a lot of others.”

“And us?”

She sighed. “Yes, although we can try our best not to. Go downstairs to the back office right now and wash your hands with hot, soapy water, and don’t touch your face until you do. I’ve got to contact the hospital in Seattle and get some information. Maybe the Red Cross too.”

He stood, making the bedsprings screech. He couldn’t help but admire her decisiveness. The same take-charge, resolute attitude that rubbed some men the wrong way—and which had drawn him to her as a strong-willed equal—was alive and well.

She followed him down the steps and waited while he washed up, then she washed her own hands.

“Will you need help taking care of Cookson? Should I get Granny Mae?”

“God, no,” Jess muttered, wiping her hands on a clean towel.

“Can you handle this alone?”

She bent a look on him. “What do you think I’ve been doing all this time in New York, Cole?”

New York, New York,
New York
. He frowned, sick of being reminded of why everything went so wrong. The tension of wartime life, compounded by Pop, compounded by so many things, came alive in him. What had Jess found there that kept her from coming home as she’d promised? What had happened that caused her to break off their courtship? The question, which he’d managed to push to the back of his mind, had come roaring to his waking thoughts since she returned to Powell Springs. “That’s what I’ve wondered for two years. What
have
you been doing there?”

Cole moved closer to Jess. His face, suddenly flushed and almost angry, was nearly in hers as he stood there. For a moment, she thought he might either shake her or kiss her. But apparently he expected an answer. The tension between them was like an electric current, snapping and dangerous. Unprepared for the sudden turn of the conversation, or the feeling that hot honey was running in her veins, she backed away, highly annoyed that he would raise the subject at this moment. She turned and with nervous, brittle energy began cleaning up the table she’d used to compound Eddie’s pills.