Silver Heart (Historical Western Romance) (Longren Family series #1) Read online

  He came back down the hallway. "I thought you would follow me."

  I blushed. I was acting like a foolish child, but I had spent little time alone with a man. In Boston, propriety meant there were chaperones. Things were different in the West.

  I followed him to the room he'd prepared or, more likely, a neighbor had seen to. It was clean and neat, and clearly not his. The dresser gleamed, neatly waxed, and the bed was covered in a lacy spread with pillows heaped high. Canary yellow curtains moved in the afternoon breeze.

  It was my room, and clearly mine alone in this clean, unknown house. I had no idea how to broach the question of how long it would be mine and only mine, or even when we would wed. I stood at the threshold, thinking only now that he had not carried me into the house, but he had, in fact, preceded me, giving me view of his shoulders and strong back but little in the way of a husband greeting a wife.

  And I swallowed hard, burying the thought. It wouldn't do to forget my place.

  He was watching me, a curious half smile that made me stumble into speech, thanking him and admiring the room, sure I was nearly out of words when we heard horses racing up to the house, heard hard, loud voices calling and footsteps across the wooden porch. Someone banged hard on the door, calling "Hutch? You there?"

  The screen door rattled, and the inside door banged too. I tried to step back into the hall or farther into the room, either way, just to get out of his way, and Mr. Longren brushed past me in my indecision. One hand brushed my arm as he passed and I shivered, then turned to follow him.

  Two men stood just inside the sitting room, filling it to nearly overflowing with their size. Broad shoulders, tan shirts rolled to mid-arm, their shirts wet with sweat. They were dusty and hot and they wore their hats until I entered behind Mr. Longren.

  "Ma'am," one said, but the other merely passed his eyes over me and said, "Hutch, you need to come." He was already turning, hat going to head, hand out to catch the door and shove it open.

  "John," my husband said. "I've just come from retrieving Miss Lucas from the railway. I'd prefer – "

  "It's bad, Hutch," the other man said. Pale eyes, graying hair, he wore wire rimmed spectacles and still held his hat against his chest.

  Mr. Longren looked past the man he'd called John, his tanned face suddenly going pale. "Where's Matthew?"

  "At the mine," John said. The screen door banged behind him as he headed for his horse.

  Mr. Longren turned his attention to the man he'd called John. Muscles moved in his jaw.

  "He's alive, Mr. Longren. Shot. You need to come."

  Hutch swore, reached for his hat, and he was already in motion when he called back to me, "Make yourself at home. Look around. I have to – "

  I reached for him. Matthew was his little brother, younger by several years, who'd followed Hutch Longren out to the silver strike. My mother had read me letters from Mr. Longren about Matthew, about his temper, his humors, and his hard drinking and hard living.

  Hutch Longren loved his brother.

  "I'm coming," I said, fumbling for the hat that had been lost on the road, realizing I needed nothing else and had nothing else. My kit wouldn't arrive for another week at least, sent from Boston to follow me up. I had no instruments but myself and whatever may be at the mine.

  "That's no place for a lady, ma'am," John said from the porch.

  "Stay here, Margaret," Hutch said, using my name for the first time, and following hard on John's heels, "Is the doc there?"

  "Accident at the Chollar mine. He'll come when he can, we need to move Matthew, get him back here or to his house, we – "

  The screen door slammed behind me. Hutch looked over his shoulder even as he moved fast for the spare horse the two men had brought with them. "Go inside. I'll be back."

  "I'm coming with you," I said, and for a minute, couldn't think how. There were three horses in the front of the house and three men mounting them. I'd ridden, of course, but in Boston, with the modern streetcars and carriages, it wasn't often. I didn't know how to saddle a horse, where to find a saddle, or even how to ride the way they rode out here. And the horses in the corral were strangers as much as Mr. Longren.

  "Stay. Here." He sounded angry, was already astride a huge, red beast, and wheeling away from me to ride. The other men dug their heels into the horses' sides.

  I raised my voice, shouting to be heard. He couldn't leave me here. "I'm a midwife," I shouted. "I can help." I didn't know Matthew, but Mr. Longren's letters had brought him alive. Young, impetuous. Important, to Hutch.

  Just the slightest pause. I saw his shoulders sink from their high defensive hold. He didn't want to take me. But, this was for Matthew.

  Later, I'd wonder if Hutch Longren had been as nervous as I had been at our initial meeting, nervous enough to almost welcome any excuse to get some time away. Later, I'd wonder how wise I'd been to insist on following, and what would have happened if I couldn't have helped Matthew.

  But that was later. All I knew was someone was hurt and I had to help.

  Longren stopped the horse, turned back to me, and held his hand out. It would be the fastest way and I wouldn't have to try to ride. I ran to him, silently cursing the tight skirt that bound my legs. Easier by far, Virginia, for railway and wagon riding, but the horse was another matter.

  He pulled me up across his lap and didn't wait any longer. We followed the other two horses, riding hard.

  The three men rode hard, galloping out of Gold Hill, heading northeast away from both Gold Hill and Virginia City, toward the mountains and the silver. Wind tangled my hair, covering my face and eyes, getting into my dry mouth. The heat of the day wrapped around me like Mr. Longren's arms. My back brushed against his chest with every jolt of the horse over the rocky ground.

  My heart pounded. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to help, afraid of what that would mean for Matthew Longren, and what it would mean for the man I was meant to marry. I'd attended a gun shot only once before, in Boston, when a banker cleaning his pistol had discharged it in an elegant home on Charles Street and the doctors were busy with a breech birth and the hospital was too far away. I'd succeeded then. I had to succeed now.

  Despite the situation, I was aware of the strong arms circling me, one hand holding me against him, the other holding the reins. A delicious sense of inappropriate pleasure coursed through me. I tried to deny it, and failed.

  We passed a clutch of people on the street. Little girls skipping rope stopped and stared. A woman wearing a bonnet looked up, frankly disapproving. She pulled her parcels closer and stepped off the road. I was making an impression I hadn't intended. I bit my lip and went back to worrying about Matthew Longren.

  It took only minutes to ride to the mine. Nothing but a rough wood entrance, the name painted above the entrance: Silver Sky.

  The sight of it made me tense. The sky above, anything but silver, was vast blue and open, seeming to go on forever. The land led up to it, wide and rocky, dotted with sage. The pinion pines covered the slopes above the mine. But the mine entrance itself was a midnight black hole, an opening into nothing.

  I regretted my impetuous move in joining the men. I wasn't certain I had the courage to go into that black maw, even if I was needed. I didn't want to think about Mr. Longren going daily into that Stygian blackness.

  And maybe there was no need for me to descend. Outside the mine, in a small clearing dotted with equipment, machines, wagons and horses, stood a crowd of men, some shirtless, some with rolled up sleeves. They were rough looking and filthy, few with hats. They circled a figure on the ground and looked back over their shoulders as we drew near.

  I had a moment's relief, I would not have to go into that dark to tend the charge I'd made my own, and a moment's revulsion at my cowardice.

  Then the horses stopped and I slid down before Mr. Longren could assist me. Tucking my skirts out of the way with both hands, I ran across the ground between us without waiting.

  Several of the men deta
ched from the crowd, putting up hands to ward me off.

  "Whoa, miss, you don't want to see this."

  "Lady, wait."

  "Stay back!"

  The last man reached for me, his hands finding purchase on my arms. I batted him away and heard him swear. His fingers tightened for an instant before I heard Hutch Longren shout, "Ben, let her go!" He released me instantly and I shouldered through the others, no thought of propriety.

  Matthew Longren lay in the circle of men, his face stark white with pain, his teeth gritted. He was propped up against what looked like a bedroll and that against a small wood fence, both hands clenched around his thigh, where filthy rags made a tourniquet. His trousers were soaked through and stained dark with blood but the wound had stopped pumping blood if it had.

  He was lucky, if anyone having been shot could be called lucky, and given what I'd heard in letters of his temper and his tendency to bully the worst choices, I thought lucky was apt. The bullet had caught him in the fleshy part of his thigh, missing bone as far as I could see, and missing the arteries that ran there.

  I knelt in the dirt without thinking, without introducing myself or even speaking. I wanted to see the wound, wanted to get my hands on something to clean it with, as my mother had taught me.

  "I need a knife," I said to the men around me, and they shifted and made querulous sounds. Men are never good at suddenly taking orders from a woman. When no knife was forthcoming, I looked up at the roughest of them, an enormous dark haired man with a mustache of absurd size, and said, "Sir, your knife." I held out my hand.

  On the ground, my patient scrambled backward a bit. "Who are you?" And then, more to the point, "What are you going to do with that knife?"

  I met his eyes then, about the time a much too large knife slapped into my hand, and I smiled as reassuringly as I could, which likely wasn't very. "I'm your sister-in-law," I said, and watched bright blue eyes go wide, and I felt something, even in that instant, that I couldn't afford to feel, a twist of the heart I was determined to ignore.

  Same hair, same generous mouth as his brother, same dark skin, and strangely blue eyes. But younger, closer to my age, and just now, he needed me.

  I blinked and looked away from him, forcing myself to my work, which made him scramble again, his leg starting to bleed anew from injudicious movement. The men behind him stopped his retreat

  "The knife? You're – Maggie? Margaret? What's the knife for?"

  An absurd need to laugh rose, the response to fear, and to the absurdity of the introductions. "Hush," I said, "and stop moving. I need to cut the trousers only. I need to see the wound." And looked up to the nearest pair of male legs to find that Hutch Longren now stood there. I nodded at him, as if certain he would understand, and he did, leaning down to put his hands on his brother's shoulders.

  "Easy, Matthew, let her work. She's a trained midwife."

  That got a harsh, nervous laugh from the men who still ringed us and on the wave of the laughter, I used the enormous knife to cut away the cloth surrounding the bloody hole on Matthew's leg, cutting as far as I could and ripping the rest, then nodding to Hutch so he could help me move his brother and I could see the back of his leg. Moving him made Matthew cry out. I worked as fast as I could, wanting to provoke as little pain as possible.

  The bullet had gone straight through and the hole was relatively small on both sides. Someone had tied the rags above the wound, and the blood had stopped. What was left, then, was to get him something for the pain and to clean the wound. The first, he'd like but the second, not so much, and both could be accomplished at the same time.

  "Which of you has whisky?" I asked, and the men around us had the sense not to worry that Mr. Longren was their boss, but simply offered me their flasks.

  "Drink this," I said, handing one flask to Matthew. His hand brushed mine as he took it. I felt the same shock I had when Hutch had brushed against me in the house and refused to acknowledge it.

  The second flask I used to wash out the wound, which made Matthew draw in his breath and then shout. The sound echoed from the maw of the mine. I did not look at the mine, did not meet Matthew's eyes, just waited until the echoes and the patient had stilled, then, still kneeling, looked up to Hutch Longren.

  "That needs to mend, uncovered, and probably needs to be cleaned another time or two. Does he have someone to care for him at home?"

  Mr. Longren shook his head. "But he lives not a mile away." He sounded grim as he crouched now beside his brother. To his brother, he said, "We will discuss this when the bleeding has stopped," in a voice that made me glad I was not Matthew Longren.

  I thought Matthew's response, "The bleeding has already stopped, brother", was unwise, and my hands tightened just enough on his knee to both remind me that I still touched him and to suggest to him perhaps discretion was the better part of valor at present.

  The bleeding had stopped and though I might not be the traditional doctor these men were used to, there was a general loosening of tension. The knot of them loosened as well, men stepping back and away, pinches of tobacco being shared, voices rising. I didn't mind no longer being in a circle of strong smelling strangers, or having the room to think what needed to be done next and someone to consider options with.

  Hutch remained with me and his brother, and the two men who had ridden with us.

  "We need the wagon to take him back to his home," I said, and saw the slighter of the men, the one with the eyeglasses, blink owlishly at me, as if surprised I would continue to give orders or make suggestions now that the emergency was over. I met his eyes, and refused to look away until he did. Once he looked back to Matthew, I looked at the man Mr. Longren had called John and then at my intended. "Or is there something here we can use?" I did not want to be left waiting as Mr. Longren went back for the wagon we had used.

  "How about the steam donkey?" one of the clutch of men called, and laughter followed that, though it seemed good natured.

  I turned to stare at Hutch Longren and found him grinning. "You'd best ignore that lot," he said. "Steam donkey's for hauling within the mine."

  "Very funny," Matthew said. "I can ride."

  "No, you can't," Mr. Longren said, at the same time I said, "You certainly cannot." Our eyes met and he nodded slightly. "There's a wagon 'round here somewhere. John'll round it up," he said, nodding, and John started away. "Wait a minute," Mr. Longren stopped him, and when he turned back, nodded to me. "John Overton, this is Margaret Lucas, my betrothed. Miss Lucas, Mr. Overton manages and oversees Silver Sky mine for me, and tries to keep Matthew out of trouble."

  "Failed at that," John Overton said, as he nodded to me, hat lifted slightly.

  Matthew started to protest, caught his brother's no-longer-smiling glance, and subsided.

  In due course, the pale man with spectacles, Marcus Millichap, as it turned out also a mine foreman, went off with John Overton and the two returned with a wagon they'd collected blankets and branches for, trying to soften the bare boards of it. Matthew was loaded into the wagon and though he turned quite pale, he remained stoic throughout. Two horses were hitched and Mr. Longren offered me a hand to climb up. I shook my head.

  "I'd rather walk," I said, and as he started to protest, "I can keep a better eye on the patient here – " which made Matthew sputter indignantly. I could use the time to clear my head, as well, for seated so close to Matthew, I doubted my head would remain even as clear as it was.

  Hutch Longren gave me a considering look, one that, if I didn't imagine it, seemed not only appraising but impressed, then turned and clicked at the horses and began to lead us back to the house.

  I walked beside the wagon, just slightly behind Matthew so I didn't have to meet his eyes or Hutch Longren's. My head didn't clear at all and through the few miles we covered, I found myself looking from Hutch's strong, broad shoulders to Matthew's dusty curve of neck, and my heart refused to slow its frantic pace.

  Chapter 3

  Twilight on my first da
y in Gold Hill found me heating foods the neighbors had brought by when they heard about the accident. I didn't manage to meet anyone. They came like brownies are supposed to do in the night, cleaning up and leaving food and going away again, because that's what neighbors do when there's an accident.

  "Accident my – eye," Mr. Longren amended, seeing a note left under a Dutch oven that contained chicken and potatoes.

  Together, we had brought Matthew in, his arms around our shoulders, and I had studiously not thought about what I was doing, trying to jar him as little as possible but of course, our heights were wildly different and Matthew listed to my side, which was, at least, the uninjured leg.

  "I should go home," Matthew said as we installed him on the davenport, his leg extended and propped up. "Miss Lucas, I surely didn't mean – "

  His earnest face made me laugh before he even finished. "To get shot on my first day?"

  He looked mortified, and more so when Hutch said, somewhat lightly, "Thought she might as well know what she's in for, did you?"

  But following that was an uncomfortable silence. If I hadn't known my place or what was expected of me before, I certainly couldn't know it now. But as the sun was going down, and as I was hungry, I assumed both men were as well, and cooking would be familiar, even if all I was doing tonight was building a fire and heating foods the neighbors had brought. I took my leave of them both, glancing back as I went into the large, well-scrubbed kitchen. They were eyeing each other warily and though I thought Matthew had the most to fear, Hutch looked equally ill at ease.

  I didn't try to eavesdrop, and I made certain to move as came naturally in the kitchen which, given it was a kitchen I didn't know, was loud. I dropped things, bumped into things, and, once, swore audibly when my elbow came in contact with the iron cook stove. Maybe because I didn't try to be silent, or maybe because Mr. Longren was unused to having anyone else in his house, they spoke in normal voices and once I found I could overhear, I made a point of doing so.