Chapter Nine
WILLA PACED THE STRAW-covered floor. She ought to have gone for Papa; she would have been faster than the boy that Otto Clay, the livery owner, had sent to find a doctor. But Papa was asleep, and with that cough growing worse this evening and the stress of seeing Amos in his current condition, she didn’t want to wake him.
Where was that doctor?
She and Leroy had done the best they could for Amos. Leroy had rolled up his coat, and Willa had pressed it against Amos’s shoulder. She secured it with a length of rope Mr. Clay gave her. But a gunshot wound was nothing to mess around with, andwherewas the doctor?
A man entered the livery, and Willa stopped pacing, sure it was this Dr. JT, as Mr. Clay had called him, finally arrived. But it was the marshal’s deputy, come to find out what had happened. Willa directed him to Leroy, who’d witnessed the whole thing.
Willa had been in her room at the hotel after convincing Papa to take more of his elixir when a furious knock sounded on Papa’s door next to hers. It had been Leroy. Papa, deeply asleep, hadn’t awoken, and Willa threw on her coat and raced back to the livery with Leroy.
From what Leroy told her, he had been inside one of the wagons, mixing up some more medicines, while Amos sat outside, finishing his supper. From out of nowhere, Leroy heard Amos shout. He looked outside the wagon, just in time to see two men approach, one holding up a revolver. Leroy grabbed his own pistol and warned them to stop. When they didn’t, he aimed, but the other man shot first, striking Amos in the shoulder. Leroy returned a shot almost instantly, hitting the man. The man’s companion ran off, and now two men lay clinging to life in the livery.
Leroy recounted the occurrence to the deputy, who’d introduced himself to Willa as Rance Hawkins.
“They likely came to steal the medicines,” she added to Leroy’s story. “Or in the hopes that Papa kept his money here.”
Deputy Hawkins nodded. “We’ll keep an eye out for the other man.” He went to check on the man Leroy had shot, whom Mr. Clay had kindly kept watch over. He stood there barely a minute, speaking with the livery man before returning to Willa and Leroy.
“I’m afraid to say that man appears to no longer be with us. The doctor can confirm that once he arrives.”
Leroy frowned. “I didn’t mean to kill him.”
“He shot first, and it appeared he had intentions of robbing you.” Deputy Hawkins glanced back at the dead man. “You had no other choice so far as I’m concerned.”
Leroy nodded, his hands on his hips, but Willa could tell he was sorrowful. She couldn’t imagine what Leroy was thinking, or what it felt like to have that burden resting on his heart. She laid a hand on his arm, uncertain what to say but wanting to be of some comfort to the man who’d been like an uncle to her.
“It’s all right, Willa,” he said, his voice covering up anything he was truly feeling.
The door opened again, and this time a tall man in a long, fine wool coat entered. The doctor, finally! Willa strode across the floor, then stopped still when the man glanced her way.
“Miss Rousseau,” Dr. Gatewood said. His shoulders seemed to slump in relief. He said something to the man that had followed him in, and then strode to her.
She told herself it didn’t matter what a fine figure he cut in the low lights of the livery, his coat unbuttoned and his hat tilted just so. Her daydreams of dancing across a ballroom floor with him were hardly important when Amos’s life lay on the line.
“No,” she said, not realizing she’d said the word aloud until Dr. Gatewood lifted his eyebrows.
The deputy looked at her curiously, but Leroy frowned. He must have recognized Dr. Gatewood too.
