Blessing Read online

  What if he couldn’t stop her? What if she was leaving to get away from him?

  He sorted through possibilities in his mind, not liking any of them. He had to get to the supply wagon before Lester McClain headed over Alpine Pass with his passengers.

  Aaron sprinted around the corner just in time to see McClain and Sam Kirkland lifting a wooden trunk with brass latches onto the rear of the wagon. He shoved through the crowd, searching frantically for Uley. He didn’t see her anywhere.

  He didn’t know what else to do except holler her name. “Uley! Uley! Where is—” She. Where is she?

  Aaron spied Laura across the road, walking toward the wagon with a knit shawl draped over her head. “Laura!” He bolted forward. “Where’s Uley?”

  “She’s coming. Right there.”

  Aaron spun in the direction of Laura’s pointed finger. Here she came, up the street, bundled for a journey.

  Uley saw him and hesitated. Oh, Father. It’s the only way, isn’t it? Only I never meant for Aaron to get hurt in the middle.

  He raced forward and grabbed her arms, his face already gone rock-hard with anger and grief. He didn’t care who heard his words now. “You weren’t going to say anything to me?”

  “No, Aaron. I thought it best this way.”

  “Do you mind telling me why you’re doing this?”

  She looked up at him, her face etched with her own intense pain. “I think you know, don’t you? I have to go, Aaron,” she said. “It’s the only way things can be fair for the both of us.”

  He stared down at her. “I found out about this from Beth. Everybody in town’s talking about the two sweethearts running away. That’s ironic, don’t you think? When it should be us?”

  “I can’t stay.”

  “I don’t want you to go.”

  “I have to.”

  “I’d like to know why, Uley. And I’d like to know why you have to go this way.”

  “I have to help Laura. And I have to help myself.” Tears pooled in her eyes. “It’s the right thing, Aaron. I’ve prayed about it, and this the only possibility that’s come. It may not be easy, but it’s right.”

  “Tell me. You tell me why it’s right.” But already, in his heart, he knew.

  “Because I have to do it, Aaron. I have to find out who I am.”

  He couldn’t very well argue with her reasoning. He knew how desperately she needed to disappear into a cocoon and be born again as a butterfly. She was right, and he knew it. But it killed him to think of her leaving.

  “I didn’t, didn’t know how to tell you. Early this morning, when we’d decided, I should have told you.” She was choking on the words. “Should have, Aaron, only I couldn’t.”

  He asked, already knowing that she would never do this if she didn’t have to. If he loved her, he ought to want what was best for her. “You weren’t planning on seeing me again.”

  With tears sliding down her face, she nodded. As if to etch the details of his face on her memory forever, Uley reached up with one hand, fingers outstretched, to curve her palm around the length of his jaw.

  “Oh, Aaron,” she said, her eyes reflecting every bit of the anguish in her heart.

  He saw every part of the pain he knew she felt. Knowing they shared it didn’t make accepting it easier. “Me too.” He whispered his next words. “Don’t look back toward me, Julia Kirkland. Go out and become the person you’ve dreamed about.” Oh, Lord. Give me the love for her that helps me let her go. Give me a love for her that wants her to have these things. He couldn’t ask her to come back to him. She wouldn’t be the same person then. And he was certain she might see things differently when the time came.

  I release her to You, Father. Take away all of my holds on her. Your ways are so much bigger than my ways. Help me to accept that.

  “I will,” she said, sniffing, her expression full of gratitude and something more, because he had released her to be who she needed to be. “Oh, Aaron. I will.”

  Just then, a menacing voice growled out from the crowd behind them. “Why, fancy meeting you here, Aaron Brown.”

  Aaron released Uley.

  “Turn around, you yellow-belly. I’m not going to go after you from the back the way you went after me. I’m going to shoot you right straight on, the way a man should.”

  Aaron slowly turned around. “Harris Olney.”

  “One and the same.”

  “You can’t do this.”

  “I can and I will. Put your hands up, Brown. I don’t have any qualms about shooting you in cold blood. Any man who tries to stop me is going to beat you to the grave.”

  “You’re supposed to be locked up.”

  “Ha! Everybody was feeling safe about that, too, weren’t they? Putting a man like Old Ben Pearsall in my place. I built that jailhouse, and I taught Pearsall just about everything he knows. It wasn’t hard to bust out, Brown. I didn’t even enjoy it none. It was all just too easy.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t shoot me, then.” Aaron stalled for time. “Maybe you won’t enjoy it if it’s too easy.”

  “Oh,” Olney said, offering up a sharp cackle of sarcasm, “I’ll enjoy this no matter how I do it. Take your last breath, Brown.” Olney leveled the gun at Aaron, holding it steady. He licked his lips, wetting them in anticipation, then placed his forefinger on the trigger.

  The sudden motion from Uley Kirkland proved enough to distract Olney. “Aaron! Get down!”

  “You. Why are you always around when trouble starts, Uley? A man would think you’d learned by now.”

  “Seems to me I’m not the only one around, Olney.” She stepped toward Aaron.

  In an instant, fire belched from the six-shooter. Aaron felt an impact. He stumbled back. But the rush of pain hadn’t come.

  Aaron rose on all fours and moved toward Harris, gripping a knotted tree limb that lay in the street. He leapt up, roaring with rage. He rushed Olney with the branch. He smashed it toward his head before Olney had the chance to bring the gun around. Olney deflected the limb’s blow. The six-shooter flew from Olney’s fist.

  Aaron threw his fist into Olney’s fleshy stomach. The blow found its mark. Olney’s stomach felt like a cow’s udder filled with milk. Olney doubled over.

  Charlie Hastings grabbed Olney and wrenched his arms behind his back. “You’re finished, Olney. If this jail won’t hold you, I’ll ride you down to Gunnison tomorrow, where you can’t do any more damage.”

  Aaron disdainfully backhanded the grime from his own face. It wasn’t until he looked down to wipe the dregs off on his pants that he saw the front of his shirt.

  The sweet, cloying scent filled his senses. Its identity began to register.

  Blood.

  Blood covered his shirt. Sticky, congealing, still warm, blood not his own.

  He pivoted, remembering the odd feeling of impact, the movements of the woman who’d run to shield him in the street. “Dear God, no…” he prayed. Uley was the one who’d hollered and made that shot veer wild. Or maybe it hadn’t veered wild at all. “Uley? Uley!”

  She didn’t answer.

  Sam Kirkland knelt in the dust, his head bent low, tears running down his face, leaving great dirty streaks, as Uley lay bleeding in his arms. Aaron ran to them, sick with dread.

  Sam lifted tortured eyes to Aaron. “Uley’s been hit saving you, Brown.”

  He knelt beside them. “Uley?” He gripped Sam’s arm as the crowd began to move in around them. “Let me have Uley, Mr. Kirkland. I’ll find Doc Gillette.”

  “You know Gillette ain’t in town, boy. He never keeps his office open. He’s always up on the hill, digging for gold. We might as well not have a physician in Tin Cup.”

  “It’s worth a try, Kirkland. He might be here today, by some miracle, or some blessing.” He didn’t know it, but tears were streaming down his face as well.

  Sam nodded, extending his arms, and Aaron gathered Uley’s crumpled body against his. When he saw her face, he swallowed to fight back a sense of i
mpending doom. She lay heavily against his chest. He knew she was almost gone.

  “Wait. Here,” Sam said gruffly. He ripped away the front of his own garment and used the linen to stanch the bleeding. “Maybe that’ll help.”

  Aaron stood with her cradled in his arms, shouting futilely: “Doc Gillette? Is Doc Gillette in this crowd?”

  When no one answered, he started running toward the doctor’s storefront office. “He won’t be there,” someone hollered at him. “He’s never there except in the evenings. He’s always up prospecting.”

  Aaron didn’t listen. He just kept running and praying. Lord, don’t let her die. Please, God. Save her!

  A small group of men began to follow him up toward Spruce Street. He reached the physician’s office and banged on the front door. To his utter amazement, he saw movement in the back room.

  “He’s there!” he shouted. Then, to Uley: “Hang on, little one. We’ve got a doc in town today. Things are going your way.”

  The men behind him took up the cry. “He’s there!”

  Dr. John Francis Gillette, beard flowing down past his chest, came forward at what seemed a plodding burro’s pace to open his front door.

  “Uley Kirkland’s been shot, Doc,” Aaron said the minute the door cracked open. “We’re going to need your help.”

  Gillette fingered his long, elegant beard. “You’d best bring him on in here. Lucky kid, Uley. Today I’ve taken a toothache, and I didn’t much feel like digging.”

  Aaron placed Uley’s dead weight on Doc Gillette’s long, narrow examination table while the other men filed in and took seats in the waiting room.

  “Hope he can save that kid.”

  “Uley’s such a fine citizen.”

  “Don’t know what we’d do without Uley Kirkland.”

  “Can’t feel much of a pulse,” Gillette said. He removed the cloth Sam had torn from his own clothing. It was already soaked with blood. “Now,” Gillette instructed, “I’ve got some tedious operating to do here. My hands are a sight more sure when I don’t have somebody looking over my shoulder.”

  “But I could help you,” Aaron suggested, desperate to remain by Uley’s side.

  Gillette carried over a thin tin tray containing bandages and surgical instruments. “I don’t need your help. Now get on out there and sit on a bench with the rest of them.”

  “I want to be here.”

  A pair of scissors paused in midair. “The longer you hem and haw, the longer I’ll wait before doing what I need to do.”

  Reluctantly Aaron backed away. “You sure? You sure I can’t?”

  “Get out of here, mister. I’ve got enough on my hands trying to save this kid’s life.”

  Aaron backed through the door just as Gillette began cutting Uley’s shirt away. The scissors began to snip the bloody fabric and Gillette began to pry the shirt from the wound.

  Aaron sat down beside Jasper Warde. He’d lost his hat somewhere. He had absolutely no idea where it had gone. He buried his face in his hands. How many times must he face losing Uley in one day?

  Dear God, he prayed, I can let her go where she needs to go. I turned her over to You so she could live, Lord, not so she could die. Please, please, Father.

  Aaron had never felt this helpless. A clock hung on the south wall of the room, its pendulum nudging to the right…back to the left…marking off the moments in an agonizing, torpid tempo.

  Actually, only three minutes passed. Then Dr. John Francis Gillette bellowed from his operating room. “Good grief! Good grief!”

  Every man hurled up out of his seat. Gillette slammed through the door and pressed his back against it.

  “Who knew about this?” Gillette bellowed.

  When the physician first yelled, Aaron thought the worst had happened. He figured Uley had gone on to meet the Lord, the one he’d just been bargaining with, pleading with. But then he saw Gillette’s astonished face, and he felt his heart stop.

  “Who knew about this?” Gillette shouted, mopping his face.

  Aaron had been so concerned about her life, he hadn’t even thought of it. Uley had been found out.

  “That, that, person,” Gillette hollered, the stark realization fully registering on his face. “That ain’t a boy I’m operating on in there. Uley Kirkland is a gal!”

  His announcement was met with momentary stunned silence. Then everybody started whispering at once.

  “No.”

  “It cain’t be.”

  “Think what that gal’s been doing.”

  “Think what that gal’s been saying.”

  “Think what we’ve been saying.”

  “Uley Kirkland? A gal?”

  At that moment, the front door swung open. Sam Kirkland barged in. So did Tin Can Laura.

  “Where is she?” Sam asked, forgetting the charade in his moment of anguish. “Where’s my daughter?”

  Hollis Andersen spoke up first. “Your, your daughter is on the doc’s examination table, probably getting her just rewards for fooling us all so long.”

  Gilbert Hughes poked an accusatory finger at Sam Kirkland. “We thought Uley was one of us.”

  “Yeah.”

  Laura piped up then, unable to believe the doubt and the betrayal she read on their faces. “Uley’s the only friend I got in the world who’ll help me,” Laura blubbered, sounding every bit like a calf bawling. “Doc, you’ve got to save her.”

  “Let me in there to see my daughter,” Sam roared.

  Gillette motioned for Sam and Laura to follow him. “I don’t like it much, but I’ll finish the surgery with you in attendance. I think, given the circumstances…”

  Aaron didn’t need an invitation. He followed Laura and Sam. They gathered around her, standing together, Uley’s imperfect but loving family, as Gillette drew out his big iron tweezers and went digging for the bullet. Aaron knelt beside Uley. Her hat lay to one side now, all her beautiful, wispy hair tossed in knots around her face. He clutched her hand. “Crazy girl,” he whispered. “Always stepping in the way of something.” You’ve been strong enough to handle everything else and you can be strong enough to pull through this, too.”

  Lester McClain’s supply wagon left an hour later than usual that afternoon. He took no passengers with him. He left the old trunk sitting on the front steps of the town hall, knowing some kindly soul would fetch it to Sam Kirkland so that the man could claim it. The poor man had enough on his mind right now without worrying what to do about his daughter’s trunk.

  Charlie Hastings stood watch over Harris Olney at the jailhouse all afternoon. “I don’t want you getting yourself tied up with any more ill deeds,” he said as he brandished his Winchester.

  “You ain’t even gonna bring me any supper?” Olney asked pitifully.

  “No. I’m not going to give you any more chances. This town’s seen enough of you to last a long time.”

  At six that evening, Hastings saddled up two horses and tied the prisoner to one of the mounts. “I was going to wait until morning to do this,” he told Olney as he led him outside and bound him to the saddle. “I changed my mind, though. Don’t even want you spending another night in this town. The sooner we get your rotten hide out of Tin Cup, the better.” As Hastings rode out of town, he saluted Ben Pearsall. “I’ll be back from Gunnison in three days.”

  “We’ll be waiting.” Pearsall waved back. “I’ve got plans to deputize you.”

  Upstairs at Ongewach’s place, Santa Fe Moll was lamenting her misfortune at losing one of the establishment’s best girls. She’d known when Laura missed breakfast this morning and her room turned up empty that something had gone amiss. But the men in this town could be just as close-mouthed and stubborn as they were greedy. She and Charles conducted a thorough search, but it was obvious that any man who knew anything had opted to keep his trap shut. And just after dinnertime, Moll realized where Laura would be.

  She’d be with Uley Kirkland.

  Moll considered marching right over to the Kirk
lands’ and bringing Laura back home. But when Moll thought about it some more, she decided she’d just leave well enough alone. In a way, she envied Laura. She envied her having her youth, a sweetheart, a chance to start life over.

  Wouldn’t do to be making any heartfelt decisions about this, she reminded herself. She wasn’t a heartfelt sort of woman. But something odd had softened her heart, something that felt unfamiliar. She decided to make the decision on behalf of business, instead. If every fellow in this town was going to protect Laura, who was she to do any different? She could always find another hurdy-gurdy girl.

  The sun was just beginning to set over Tin Cup that evening as Sam, Laura and Aaron waited futilely beside Uley.

  “Come on, Julia,” Sam whispered to her. “Jubilee. I’m here.”

  “I’m here, too,” Laura whispered. “I ain’t leavin’ without you. And I sure hope you ain’t leaving without me.”

  “You do this for yourself.” Aaron gripped her hand. “Not for me. You’ve got so much to look forward to. So many of your dreams—” His voice broke. He couldn’t go on.

  Laura stood behind him, doing her best to comfort him, her small hand lying on his broad shoulder. “She asked me one time what it felt like when a man you loved came close,” Laura said. “I figure she was talking about you.”

  Dusk deepened into nighttime. They kept no track of time. Aaron stroked the hair now displayed in tendrils around Uley’s pale face. Her breathing remained terrifyingly shallow. “She’s everything I’ve ever wanted in my life. You know that? She had all these notions she had to be a fine lady before she’d be right for me. But I wanted her just the way she is. Muddy boots and britches and all.”

  As the morning sun began to rise over the Saguache Mountains, Laura noticed Aaron doing his best to keep his head erect and his eyes open. “You need to sleep, Aaron,” she told him. “You had quite a fight with Olney. I’ll bet your body’s aching.”

  “I don’t want to leave her, Laura.”

  “Some things’re just part of nature, Aaron. You have to rest now so when she wakes up you can sit with her.”