Cactus Flower (38 page)

      
Who
the devil …? Eulalie turned her head and frowned at where the words
had come from. Was that Mrs. Johnson? She couldn’t tell for sure because
she wasn’t wearing her spectacles. “Louise?” she croaked, alarmed
when she heard her voice. Was she sick? Is that why she was lying in
her bed with the doctor in residence?

      
And
then it all came back to her.

      
“Gilbert
Blankenship,” she muttered, her heart sinking and beginning to ache
along with her thigh, where he’d shot her. He’d
shot
her!

      
“I’m
afraid so, dear.” Mrs. Johnson placed a cool, damp cloth on Eulalie’s
forehead.

      
Eulalie
appreciated the woman’s ministrations, but she wanted information
more than she wanted damp rags. “Patsy?” she whispered, hoping she
wouldn’t have to add any more words to her question, since she felt
remarkably weak. She supposed that happened when a body got shot. Damn
Gilbert Blankenship to perdition.

      
Mrs.
Johnson didn’t answer. Eulalie, who had allowed her eyelids to drift
downward, opened them again instantly. “Louise?”

      
With
a sigh, Mrs. Johnson said, “The men went after them. I’m sure she’ll
be fine, and they’ll bring her back here safe and sound.”

      
“He
got her?”

      
“I’m
afraid so, dear, but you know Nicky. He and that lieutenant feller and
the sheriff and a whole posse rode out of here a couple of hours ago.
Junius Taggart found out which way the man rode with your sister. I’m
sure the posse will prevail. They know their way around out on that
desert, you know, and I can’t feature that feller who snatched Miss
Patsy is any match for them.”

      
Perhaps.
But it only took one bullet. Or a well-placed knife thrust, and both
Louise and she knew it. Eulalie couldn’t help it; she started crying.
She’d tried
so
hard to keep her sister safe, and this is what
it had come to. Gilbert Blankenship, who had been the plague of both
their lives ever since he’d seen Patsy on stage three years earlier,
had come back to haunt them. And he now had Patsy.

      
Louise
Johnson tutted and patted her hand. “There now, Eulalie, don’t cry.
Nicky won’t let any harm come to your sister. He wouldn’t dare.”

      
Dr.
Canning came to Eulalie’s bedside and loomed over her. “Listen to
Louise, Miss Eulalie. Nick Taggart will bring her back. And you have
to stop worrying, or you’ll make yourself sick. We have to watch out
for infection when it comes to bullet wounds. Won’t do to allow yourself
to get weak. Here. I’m going to give you another little dose of laudanum.”

      
Eulalie
thought about protesting, then realized that to do so would not merely
keep her in pain, but would be for naught. She couldn’t do a blessed
thing to help her sister now. She’d done what she could already, and
it hadn’t been enough. She whispered, “Very well,” and resigned
herself to sleep. Sleep was better than wakefulness right now. Oblivion
was what she needed. Sweet unconsciousness.

      
She
prayed she wouldn’t dream.

      
*
* * * *

      
Nick
burst through Eulalie’s front door, and was instantly brought up short.
The whole damned parlor was filled to bursting with citizens of Rio
Peñasco. What’s more, they were all on their knees, and the preacher,
Reverend Huffington, was in the process of exhorting God to help Eulalie
heal and help the posse find Gilbert Blankenship and bring Patsy back
safely.

      
“Lord,
in your infinite mercy, save our sister Eulalie Gibb!” he cried in
his most portentous tones. “Father in heaven, allow our sister Eulalie
to heal completely and rejoin your flock! And bring Miss Patsy back
to us, Lord!”

      
Nick
couldn’t argue with the sentiments, but he didn’t have the patience
to hang around in the parlor praying while who knew what agonies Eulalie
was suffering. He skirted the kneeling mob and made his way to her bedroom,
where he tried for silence as he opened the door and stuck his head
around the jamb.

      
Louise
Johnson saw him first, and her face broke into a stunning smile for
a moment, before the smile faded and she looked a question at him. “Patsy?”
she mouthed.

      
“She’s
safe,” said Nick in a rumbling whisper. He’d never been much good
at whispering, his voice being as big as the rest of him.

      
“Thank
God,” whispered Mrs. Johnson.

      
Carefully
closing the door behind him, Nick tiptoed into the room, at which activity
he was about as successful as he was when attempting to whisper. Doc
Canning glanced over his shoulder at him, saw his face, which probably
looked as scared as he felt, and gave him a small smile. Nick felt moderately
encouraged.

      
“She’s
doing pretty well, Nick,” said Canning. “The wound was clean, and
the bullet came out easily enough. I disinfected the wound, and I don’t
think the bullet was in there long enough to poison her. If we’re
careful and infection doesn’t set in, she’ll be right as rain in
a few weeks.”

      
Nick
had made it to Eulalie’s bedside by this time, and was looking down
upon her with a heart full to bursting. At the doctor’s words, he
shut his eyes and thought,
thank God, thank God, thank God
. Naturally,
because he was a man and a blacksmith and all, he didn’t say the words
aloud.

      
Nevertheless,
he was ever so grateful, both to God and to Doc Canning, whose hand
he grabbed now, startling the man into dropping a tongue depressor he’d
been about to stick into his black bag. “Thanks, Doc. You did a good
job.”

      
“For
Pete’s sake, Nick, be careful.” But Dr. Canning looked pleased as
he stooped to pick up his errant tongue depressor.

      
Nick
grabbed a chair from Eulalie’s dressing table and sat on it. “I’ll
just sit with her for a while.” His eyes dared either the doctor or
Mrs. Johnson to challenge his right to do so.

      
“Well
…” Mrs. Johnson appeared doubtful.

      
“I’m
staying here,” growled Nick.

      
“Nick?”

      
The
tiny voice startled all of them. Nick jumped a yard and instantly fell
to his knees beside the bed. He grabbed Eulalie’s hand. “You’re
awake,” he said.

      
Eulalie
said weakly, “Patsy?”

      
“She’s
all right. Fuller’s got her, and he’s bringing her back right now.”

      
“Thank
God,” whispered Eulalie.

      
“And
Patsy herself. She conked Blankenship over the head with a big pot.
Well, technically, I reckon she got his shoulder, but …” He shut
up, figuring nobody needed to know all the details.

      
“And
Blankenship?”

      
“Dead.”

      
Eulalie’s
eyelids fluttered. “Thank God.”

      
Nick
supposed it wasn’t very nice to thank God for someone’s death, but
he didn’t blame Eulalie one iota. He said, “Yeah. He’s buried
in Black Water Draw.”

      
“How
appropriate.”

      
He
grinned and squeezed her hand. Glancing around, he decided it was time
for the doctor and Mrs. Johnson to skedaddle. What he had to say to
Eulalie next was embarrassing and he didn’t want witnesses.

      
But
he’d made up his mind, as he and Junius rode back to town as fast
as they could, given the blackness of the night and the perils of the
desert, that he was sick of the way things were. As much as the notion
of marriage made his stomach hurt, still more did the notion of losing
Eulalie make his heart hurt. He aimed to make certain there were no
more doubts in anybody’s mind about his union with Eulalie. He was
tired of other men ogling her as she pranced about half naked on that
damned Opera House stage. She was going to stop doing
that
from
now on.

      
Besides,
her sister was going to marry that idiot Fuller, and Nick feared that
Eulalie might decide to move back to New York or Chicago or somewhere
equally far away from him, if he didn’t do something radical to secure
her presence in Rio Peñasco and, therefore, his life. He knew it sounded
dramatic, and drama made him sick and reminded him of his stepmother,
but the truth was that he didn’t think he’d survive if he lost Eulalie.
If he could help it, he wasn’t ever going to find out.

      
Therefore,
he intended to propose marriage to her. Right here. Right now—or soon
as he got rid of the other people in the damned room. He scowled at
Mrs. Johnson and Dr. Canning as he resumed his chair. “I’ll take
over now,” he said.

      
Doc
Canning rolled his eyes. “You aren’t a doctor, Nick.”

      
Nick
heated up his glower some. “Neither are you.”

      
“Tsk,”
said Mrs. Johnson. She said it with a smile, though, and took the doctor’s
arm. “Let’s leave Nicky and Eulalie alone for a minute or two, Doc.
I have a feeling Nick has something important to say to her.”

      
The
doctor appeared puzzled for a second, but Mrs. Johnson yanked him toward
the door. Nick blessed the woman as a saint.

      
As
soon as the door closed behind the doctor and Mrs. Johnson, Nick opened
his mouth to demand that Eulalie marry him. A gentle snore smote his
ears, and he shut his mouth again with a click of teeth. He stared at
his beloved.

      
The
damned woman was asleep!

      
He
muttered, “Aw, hell,” crossed his arms over his chest, sat back
in the stupid little dressing-table chair, and decided he’d just wait.
But he’d be damned if he’d leave this room until she agreed to marry
him.

      
Chapter
Seventeen
 

      
Three
weeks after Gilbert Blankenship shot Eulalie and died as a result, Eulalie
and Nick, Patsy and Gabriel Fuller, along with Junius Taggart, Sheriff
Wallace and Mrs. Johnson and several other leading citizens of Rio Peñasco,
stood on the boardwalk outside the Loveladys’ mercantile establishment.
Eulalie still had to lean on Nick for support, although her leg was
healing nicely. Anyhow, Nick was big enough to handle her weight. Thank
God he favored women with meat on their bones! She didn’t fancy spending
the next however many years of her life married to a man who carped
at her about her weight.

      
“This
is so exciting,” said Mrs. Johnson, who was wearing her best hat,
the one with pink flowers on it.

      
“Shore
is,” agreed Junius, who was in an even better mood than usual this
fine autumn morning. “We don’t gen’ly get real, live actors visitin’
Rio Peñasco.”

      
“I’m
so happy they could come.” Patsy dabbed her eyes with her handkerchief.

      
“I
am, too,” agreed Eulalie. “I’d hate to get married without the
family present.”

      
“I’m
glad mine won’t be,” muttered Nick, who kept his arm around Eulalie
as if he feared she might break if he let go. That was fine with her.

      
“You
will, too, have family present,” Eulalie chided him. “I’d like
to know who Junius is, if he isn’t family.”

      
Nick
swapped a big grin with his uncle. “Aw, hell, Junius isn’t family.
He’s a friend.”

      
“Nicky
was kind of unlucky in his family,” Junius said in a confiding tone
and winking at Eulalie. “But I don’t hold that against him none.”

      
As
ever when the stagecoach was expected, the first herald of its arrival
was a cloud of red-brown dust in the west that gradually resolved itself
into six horses and then the stage itself, barreling towards Rio Peñasco
amid the thunder of horses’ hooves and rattling wheels and the cheers
and applause of the town’s citizens. Even before the stage came to
a stop, members of the Gibb Theatrical Company braved the dust to lean
out of the windows and wave to the assembled crowd.

      
“There’s
Uncle Harry!” Patsy cried, pressing her hands to her cheeks in an
ecstasy of delight.

      
“And
I see Aunt Florence!” announced Eulalie, similarly enraptured.

      
“And
there are Marcus and Horatia and Irving!”

      
“It
looks as if your whole family decided to pay a visit,” observed Nick.

      
“Yes,”
Eulalie said joyfully. “I’m so happy!” And she burst into tears,
proving yet again that she was still a little weak from her recent ordeal.
Nick didn’t seem to mind, which proved to her once more, if further
proof were needed, that he was the most wonderful man in the world.

* * * * *

      
Eulalie
Gibb and Nicholas Taggart, and Patsy Gibb and Lieutenant Gabriel Fuller
were united in holy matrimony on November 3, 1897, in the little Baptist
church in Rio Peñasco, New Mexico Territory, in a ceremony conducted
by the Reverend Thomas P. Huffington. The church was full to the rafters
with attendees. Eulalie, who was accustomed to performing in front of
an audience, told Patsy she didn’t need to be nervous.