Miner's Daughter (34 page)

Kneeling beside Tiny, he spoke softly to the
beast. “It’s all right, boy. We’ll just see what’s going on here,
and then we’ll get you back home to rest and recuperate.”

Although Tiny whined and whimpered with pain
when Tony felt around the bloody hole, he didn’t try to bite, which
Tony thought was quite magnanimous of him, considering he was a
dumb animal, in pain and didn’t know what was going on. “I think
he’s only shot in the one spot.”

“That’s all I could find, too,” confirmed
Mari, again wiping her eyes.

“Okay. Let’s see if we can get him onto the
blanket. Then we can lift the blanket and carry him to the
motor.”

“All right.”

Tony heard her take a big breath, as if she
were bracing herself for the coming ordeal. He did the same thing.
“All right, Tiny,” he whispered, trying to make his voice as
soothing as possible. “This might hurt, boy, but we’re trying to
help you.”

“It’s all right, Tiny,” Mari added. “That’s a
good boy. Come on now.”

Inch by painful inch, they maneuvered the
gigantic dog onto the blanket. Tony had to pass a sleeve over his
dripping forehead to wipe away perspiration when they finally
succeeded. It wasn’t all that hot, but his heart was hammering like
a bass drum, his nerves were jumping like frogs in a pond, and he
was sweating like a pig. He breathed a silent prayer of thanks, and
asked God for a little more good luck. “All right.” He glanced at
Mari over the inert body of her dog. “Do you know how much Tiny
weighs?”

It touched Tony when Tiny, hearing his name,
tried to wag his tail. Damn, this was a fine dog. Spirited.
Gallant. Exactly like his owner.

She thought for a second and shook her head.
“No. I think he weighs more than I do, though.” She managed a damp
chuckle.

“That doesn’t surprise me.” He pondered the
problem of getting Tiny into the backseat of his automobile. He’d
left the door open, so all they had to do, really, was slide him
in. Unfortunately, Tiny wasn’t like Tony’s mother’s pampered
Pomeranian that weighed a couple of pounds. He was more likely to
weigh in the neighborhood of a hundred and twenty or more.

Still and all, he could have lifted him on
his own if he hadn’t been worried about his wound. And Mari was
strong. Wasn’t she? “Do you think you can lift one side of the
blanket with him in the middle if I lift the other side? If we drop
him, it won’t be good for him.”

Although the lantern didn’t provide much
light, it gave out enough for Tony to see Mari’s eyes widen with
horror. “Drop him? I’d never drop him!”

“I know you wouldn’t want to,” he said,
nettled. “But are you strong enough to lift him up. He’s no
lightweight, Mari.”

“Oh, for the love of . . . Tony, I wield a
pick and shovel six days a week, and I’m strong as an ox.”

She didn’t look like one. Nevertheless, he
grinned at her, admiring her spunk. “All right, then. I’ll take his
front half, and you take his back half, and we’ll carry him to the
machine. Let’s try not to jostle him.”

“Of course.” Her voice was tight, and he
sensed that she was steeling herself for another ordeal. So be it.
He positioned himself at Tiny’s head. Looking down, he saw Tiny’s
huge head bent upward, and he knew the dog’s eyes, trusting and in
pain, were upon him. For the umpteenth time that day, his heart was
wrenched. He whispered to the dog, “It’s all right, boy. We’ll fix
you up.”

“Oh, I hope so.” The words sounded as if
they’d been choked out of Mari’s throat without her consent.

“We’ll do our very best,” he promised them
both. “All right now. Gently. Heave him up.”

The maneuver went surprisingly smoothly. Mari
proved herself to be as strong as an ox, in truth. She was a
marvel. Tiny whimpered a little as they transported him the few
feet to the motorcar’s back door. Tony cursed himself for not
thinking to open both back doors. But he managed it well enough,
crawling into the automobile butt first and twisting to get the
opposite door open so that he could crawl out on that side.

When they were through, he hurried to Mari’s
side of the car. She stood there, looking at her dog, patently in
distress, and crying. Until tonight, Tony hadn’t known there were
so many tears in her. She was so damned strong for the most part,
he hadn’t anticipated this emotionalism from her. He actually liked
it. Made her more human or something.

He put an arm around her shoulder and guided
her to the passenger’s side of the automobile. “Here, Mari,” he
said tenderly. “Climb in next to me, and we’ll get this big lug
back to your house.” He thought of something. “Unless you think we
ought to take him to town.”

She shot him a surprised glance. “To town?
Why to town?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. To see the
doctor?”

She shook her head. “We don’t have an animal
doctor in Mojave Wells, and I don’t think Doc Crabtree would
appreciate having Tiny in his surgery. Although I could pay him,”
she added, as if suddenly struck by a happy thought.

“Forget it,” Tony said, irked. He didn’t want
Mari to pay for the doctoring of Tiny out of her own pocket. Hell,
it wasn’t her fault a moving-picture company had invaded her life.
“Let’s take him home.”

She consented with a nod, and after
retrieving the lantern, Tony drove them to the cabin. Since he knew
now how to work this transportation business, he made sure the
front door of the cabin was open, and a pad set out for Tiny before
they carried him into the house. Then they had to get down to brass
tacks.

“I don’t know anything about doctoring pets,
Mari,” he confessed, wishing he could play hero in this situation
but fearing if he tried, he might damage Tiny.

“I can do whatever can be done,” she
said.

Tony didn’t doubt her. He’d learned some time
ago that Mari had served as her own doctor, nurse, and parent for
most of her life. Because he wanted to be useful, he said, “I’ll
boil some water and get a couple more lanterns lit. You’ll need
lots of light.”

“Right. There’s some laudanum and carbolic
acid in the cupboard. Will you please bring them, too? And the
witch hazel and rubbing alcohol and the tweezers in the box beside
the sink.”

“Right.”

It didn’t take long before Mari was ready to
begin. “You might have to hold his head, Tony. Be gentle, but he’s
very strong, so you might have to use force.”

“I can handle it,” Tony declared quietly,
praying he wasn’t lying. She deserved all the help he could give
her. And then some. Not only that, but it would be humiliating to
allow Tiny to bite him.

With assurance and agility, Mari doctored her
dog, first cleaning the wound, then finding where the bullet had
lodged and pulling it out with sterilized tweezers. Tony didn’t
know how she could be so efficient under the circumstances. His own
stomach heaved, he felt like cringing, and it was all he could do
to keep from crying out several times when Tiny protested the pain
of the operation.

It was soon over, and at last Tony could help
when Mari bandaged her dog. Fortunately, by that time, the dose of
laudanum they’d dribbled down Tiny’s throat had taken effect, and
the poor dog was too sleepy to protest. When Mari’d tied the last
bandage and washed her hands, she sat back, staring at her pet.

“There,” she said. “I guess what we have to
do now is wait and see what happens.”

Tony nodded. “You did a great job, Mari.” He
was terribly impressed, actually

“He lost a lot of blood,” she murmured.

“He’ll be okay,” Tony told her with more
assurance than he felt.

She looked up from her dog to his face, and
he saw how drawn and weary she was. “I hope so. I don’t know what
I’ll do if Tiny doesn’t make it.”

Then she sat back on her heels, bent her
head, lifted her hands to her face, and started to sob as if her
heart were breaking

Tony couldn’t stand it. On his knees, he went
to her, took her in his arms, and cradled her, rocking her and
crooning to her as if she were something precious. Which she
was.

Mari knew Tony was holding her, and she
appreciated it, but she couldn’t seem to stop crying. She was so
tired and so worried about Tiny. The day had been horrible. She’d
almost been killed, and now her dog was in peril.

Burying her head against Tony’s hard
shoulder, she sobbed until exhaustion robbed her even of tears. His
hand, stroking her hair as if she were his pet, comforted her
strangely. She couldn’t recollect anyone ever trying to soothe her
this way. Is this what mothers were for? she wondered. Or
fathers?

Or lovers?

In the faint hope that the last might succeed
in this instance, she lifted her head and gazed at Tony’s face. It
looked pale and drawn in the lantern light, as if he were bushed,
too, and was only holding on to his strength because she needed
him. She loved him very much and wondered if he’d like to know it,
or if he’d be appalled. She didn’t want to risk whatever tenuous
hold they had on a relationship by admitting the state of her
heart. She did, however, feel compelled to thank him for helping
her with Tiny. And for offering her a shoulder to cry on.
Literally.

“Thanks for all your help, Tony.”

Slowly he opened his eyes and gazed down at
her. “You don’t need to thank me, Mari.”

“That’s very nice of you, but I’m grateful
anyway.”

“I’m always available for you, sweetheart.
You ought to know that by now.”

She blinked up at him, unsure what those very
kind words meant exactly. They sounded rather like a lover’s, but
Mari’d lived a hard life and wasn’t accustomed to good things
happening to her. Also, she’d hate like the devil to make a fool of
herself.

He had, however, called her sweetheart
several times this evening. This was the first time Mari’s brain
had been unoccupied enough to register the fact. Sweetheart was an
endearment not often used on casual acquaintances. At least, it
wasn’t in Mari’s circles. She wasn’t sure about the customs
prevailing in Tony’s more lofty society.

His grin came out of nowhere. “You’re staring
at me. Do I have dirt on my nose or something?”

Startled because she’d become lost in a fog,
she grinned back. “No. I’m just . . . looking.”

“Like what you see?”

His soft voice caressed her senses as his
hand had been caressing her hair. It was only then Mari realized
he’d taken out the pins and begun running his fingers through her
hair, as if he were combing it out.

Afraid to speak for fear of sounding or
looking like a lovesick idiot, Mari nodded. She sure did like what
she saw. What’s more, she no longer thought of him as only a rich,
handsome man. She’d come to know that, while he might be unfamiliar
with the hard side of life, he wasn’t a snob. He was very nice, in
fact. Kind. Magnanimous, even. And he wasn’t afraid of working
hard. Or of blood. She shivered, and he hugged her more
tightly.

“Are you cold?” he asked solicitously.

“No. I’m warm.”

“Me, too.”

She felt him kiss her hair where his hand had
just stroked, and she sighed deeply, wishing they could stay
wrapped up in each other forever. Because she wanted to, she tilted
her head up and sought his lips.

He took in a sharp breath when he realized
what she wanted, but he obliged her, kissing her slowly,
caressingly, lovingly. At least—Mari tried to be realistic about
things—the kiss felt loving. Her half of it was; she wasn’t sure
about his. She kissed him with all the love in her body, soul, and
heart, bestowing them upon him freely.

“Mari.”

“Yes?”

“I . . . I . . .”

“Yes?”

“Oh, God.”

Evidently unable to think of anything to say
that meant anything under these circumstances, Tony gave up and
showed her what he meant. That’s the way Mari interpreted his
actions. He kissed her passionately, using his lips and tongue in
ways Mari hadn’t known were possible. She was an eager student and
caught on immediately, kissing him back in kind.

“Here,” he said after several delicious
minutes. “We can’t stay here on the floor.”

“No,” she agreed. “Let’s use the bed.”

By the light of the lanterns, Mari saw that
he was shocked at her suggestion. Naturally, she became defensive.
“That’s what you want, isn’t it?” She hadn’t meant to sound quite
as challenging as all that.

He gazed at her soberly. “Yes, it’s what I
want, Mari, but I won’t do anything to hurt you.” His voice was
thick.

She shook her head. “You won’t hurt me.” She
wasn’t really all that sure of herself, but she did know she didn’t
want Tony to quit now. Mari knew what went on between men and
women. She’d honestly not thought about herself ever being with a
man, but she knew that if ever she were to experience the physical
side of love, she wanted it to be with Tony. If she lived and died
alone after this, so be it. At least she’d have known the man she
loved in the most intimate way possible.

Still, he hesitated. Puzzled and a little
hurt, Mari said, “What’s the matter, Tony? Don’t you want me?” That
would be about the most humiliating circumstance she could conceive
of, but she felt compelled to ask.

“How can you ask me that?” He sounded cranky.
“It must be obvious even to you that I want you. But-but, we’re not
married.”

Self-evident, Mari thought sourly. “Listen,
Tony, if you’re going to talk this to death, then forget it.” If he
went on in this vein, the moment would be spoiled and the
opportunity lost. Once thought entered into a spontaneous activity,
the activity lost all its fun.

He gazed at her for approximately ten more
seconds then gave up. Mari could detect the exact moment when his
caution was subsumed by his desire, and she thanked her stars for
small favors. She rose and took his hand and led him to her small
bed shoved against a wall.