Hummingbird (7 page)

He shut his eyes, trying to recall whose bedroom it was. Obviously a woman's, for there were more yellow flowers over the papered walls and a dressing table with hinged mirrors.

He had not moved—nothing more than the opening and closing of his eyelids. His left hand was tingling, it prickled as if no blood ran through it. When he flexed the fingers they closed around a cylinder of metal, and he realized with a shock that he was tied onto a bed.

So that hag was no nightmare! Who else could have tied him up? He was no stranger to caution.

Stealthily he tested the bindings to see if he could break them. But they were tight on both hand and foot.

He lifted his lids to a brown skirt, smack in front of him, standing beside the bed. He assessed it warily, wondering if he should use his right hand to knock her off her feet with one surprise punch in the gut. He let his eyelids droop shut again, pretending to go back under so he could get a look at her face through a veil of near-closed lashes.

But he couldn't tell much. She had both hands clasped over her face, forming a steeple above her nose as if she was in joy, distress, or praying. From what he could tell, he'd never laid eyes on her before. There wasn't much to her, and from the stark hairdo she wore he knew she was no saloon girl. Her long sleeves and high collar were no dance hall getup either. At last, surmising he was safe from her, he opened his eyes fully.

Immediately she withdrew her hands and leaned close to lay one—ah, so cool—along his cheek.

She didn't smell like a saloon girl either.

"Your name… tell me your name," she said with a note of intense appeal.

He wondered why the hell she wouldn't know his name if she was supposed to, so he didn't say a thing.

"Please," she implored again. "Please, just tell me your name."

But suddenly he writhed, twisted at his bindings, and looked frantically around the room in search of something.

"My camera!" he tried to croak, but his voice was a pathetic, grating thing, and pain assailed him everywhere. At his wild thrashing, she became big-eyed and jumped back a step, her eyes riveted on his lips as he mouthed again, "My camera." The attempt to utter his first words shot a searing pain through his throat. He tried again, but all that came of it was a thick rasp. But she read his lips and that was all she needed to make her suddenly vibrant.

"Cameron," she whispered in disbelief.

He wanted to correct her but couldn't.

"Mike Cameron," she said louder, as if the words were some kind of miracle. "Cameron… just imagine that!" Then she beamed and clasped her hands joyfully before her, saying, "Thank God, Mr. Cameron. I knew you could do it!"

Was she zany or what? She resembled the witch he'd imagined in the bed beside him, only she was neat and clean and easy on the eye. Still, she acted as if she didn't exactly have all her marbles, and he thought maybe he
should
have punched her one broadside when he'd had the chance, to bring her out of a spell.

She whirled now, facing the bay window, and from behind it looked like she was wiping her eyes. But why the hell would she be crying over him?

When she faced him again, he tried to say, "My name's not Cameron," but once more the pain shot through his throat, and the sound was unrecognizable.

"Don't try to speak, Mr. Cameron. You've had some foreign objects in your mouth and throat, that's why it hurts so badly. Please lie still."

He attempted to sit up, but she came immediately and pressed those cool hands of hers on his chest to stay him. "Please, Mr Cameron," she pleaded, "please don't. You're in no condition to move yet. If you promise you won't try to get up, I will remove these gauze bindings." She peered into his stark eyes that were lined with dark suspicion of her.

He had a damn good look at her then, and she looked about as strong as a ten-year-old boy, but her eyes told him she'd give it her best shot at subduing him if need be. So far, every time he'd moved, some muscle pained him like a blue bitch. He felt disinclined to tussle with even such a hummingbird as her. He scowled, gave her the merest nod, then there was a snipping sound above his head and again at his foot and she came away holding the gauze strips, freeing him to move limbs that somehow now refused to do his bidding. "Dear me, Mr. Cameron, you can see what a weakened condition you're in." She lowered his dead arm and began rubbing it deftly, massaging the muscles. "Give the blood a chance to get back…

It'll be all right in a minute. You mustn't move, though, please. I have to leave you alone for a bit while I prepare you some food. You've been unconscious for two days."

But suddenly the blood came racing back like a spring cataract, pounding through his arm, shooting needles of hot ice everywhere. He gasped and arched. But gasping hurt his throat and arching hurt everything else. He tried to swear but that hurt worse, so with a drooping of eyelids he subsided, fighting the giddy sensation that his skin was trying to explode. She clasped the inert hand under her armpit while he lay there listening to the deft sound of her beating the blood back into his prickling limb; it sounded like she was making a meat patty for his dinner. He felt nothing of her and a moment later opened his eyes to find his hand again on the sheet at his side, the woman gone from the room.

His right knee was raised. When he flexed its muscles a film of sweat erupted from his forehead and armpits. What the hell! he thought. He looked down his bare torso. A white patch decorated his right thigh. Automatically lifting his right hand to explore the bandage, a new pain gripped him, mis time centered in the hand. It felt as if some giant paw were doling out a grisly handshake. He used his left hand instead, exploring damp, clinging cloths that guarded some secret near his groin. It told him nothing.

Feeling around, he found a sheet drawn across his left leg, covering his privates, and folded back across his navel. To wake up naked in a woman's bed didn't surprise him at all, but to wake up in one belonging to a woman like this sure as hell did!

His eyes wandered while he listened to clinking, domestic sounds from around the doorway, and he wondered how long it had been since he'd been in a place like this. The room looked like some old maid's flower garden—flowers everywhere! He had no doubt it was her room, that like a hummingbird she'd fit into it. He saw a pair of portraits beside the bouquet, in a hinged, oval frame, and an open book on the bay window seat, with the tail end of a crocheted bookmark trailing from its pages. There was a small rocker with a needlepoint cushion, and a basket of sewing things on the floor beside it. A chifforobe stood against one wall, the dressing table against another.

Through the doorway he saw a green velvet settee in what must be her parlor. A little table beside it, and an oil lamp with globes of opaque white glass painted with roses. God, more flowers! he thought. A corner of a lace-curtained window with fringed, tassled shades. The parlor of a goody twoshoes, he thought, and wondered, as his eyes slid shut, how the hell he had gotten here.

"Here we are, Mr. Cameron." His eyes flew open; he jumped and winced. "I've prepared a light broth and some tea. It's not much, but we'll have to cater to your throat rather than your appetite for a short while." She held a carved wooden tray, white triangles of linen falling over its edges.

Lordy, he thought, would you look at that! Probably hand-stitched those edges herself. Bracing the tray against her midriff, she cleared a space on the bedside table. He was surprised to see the tray pull her blouse against a pair of healthy, resilient breasts—she dressed like a woman who didn't want me world to suspect she had any! But if there was one thing he knew how to find, it was a pair of healthy breasts.

His eyes followed while she crossed to the chifforobe and found a pillow. When she came to mound it up beneath his head, he again caught the drift of that starchy, fresh smell, both from her and the pillow, and he thought of many nights sleeping on the floor of a wet canvas tent with a musty blanket over him as the only comfort. As she cupped the back of his head and lifted it, ripples of pain undulated from muscles far down his body. Automatically his eyes sank shut and he sucked in a sharp breath. When his pain had subsided, her voice came again.

"I've brought something to freshen your mouth. It's just soda water." A cloth pressed his jowl and a glass touched his lips, then he pulled the salty solution into his mouth. "Hold it a minute and let it bubble around.

The effervescence is very refreshing." He was too weak to argue, but watched her covertly as she brought the bowl for him to spit into. When dribbles wet his chin, she immediately applied a warm, damp cloth, then proceeded to wash his entire face as if he were a schoolboy. He tried to jerk aside, but it hurt, so he submitted. Next she placed a napkin under his chin and dipped the spoon, cupping her hand beneath it on its way to his mouth.

She wondered why he scowled so, and talked because his near-black eyes were frightening. "You're a lucky man, Mr Cameron. You were critically shot and nearly bled to death. Luckily Doctor Dougherty…

"

She rambled on but he heard little beyond the statement that he'd been shot. He tried to lift his right hand, remembered how it hurt, used his left instead to stop the spoon. But he bumped her hand and the soup spilled on his chin, running down his neck. Goddamnit! he thought, and tried to say it—unsuccessfully—

while she dabbed, wiped, and sponged fussily.

"Behave yourself, Mr. Cameron. See the mess you've made here!"

She knew perfectly well that any man who'd just found out he'd been shot would want to know who did it! Did he have to ask, with this inflamed throat of his! She dabbed away at the stupid soup, and this time when he grabbed, he got her by the wrist, catching the washcloth, too, under his grip, bringing her startled eyes wide.

"Who shot me?" he tried, but the pain assaulted his throat from every angle, so he mouthed the words broadly,
oooo… shawt… mee
? She stared at him as if struck dumb, knotted her fist, and twisted it beneath his fingers until he felt the birdlike bones straining to be free.

"It wasn't I, Mr Cameron," she snapped, "so you've no need to accost me!" His grip loosened and she wrenched free, amazed at how strong he was in his anger "I fear I untied you too hastily," she said down her nose, rubbing her fingers over the redness where the stiff lace had scratched her wrist.

He could tell from her face that she wasn't used to being manhandled. He really hadn't meant to scare her, but he wanted some answers. She'd had plenty of time to fill him in while flitting around getting that pillow and washing his face. He reached for her wrist again but she flinched away. But he only touched it to make her look at his lips. Who shot me? he mouthed once more.

She stiffened her face and snapped, "I don't know!" then jammed the spoon into his mouth, clacking it against his teeth.

The spoon kept coming faster and fasten barely giving him time to swallow between each thrust. The bitch is going to drown me, damn her! he cursed silently. This time he grabbed the spoon in midair and sent chicken broth spraying all over the front of her spotless blouse. She recoiled, sucked in her belly, and closed her eyes as if beseeching the gods for patience. Her nostrils flared as she glared hatred at him.

He jerked his chin at the soup bowl, glowering furiously until she picked it up and held it near his chin.

He'd discovered while eating the broth that he was nearly starved. But with his left hand he was clumsy, so after a few inept attempts, he flung the spoon aside, grabbed the bowl, and slurped directly from it, taking perverse pleasure in shocking her.

A barbarian! she thought. I have been fighting to save the life of a barbarian! Like some slobbering beast, he went on till the bowl was empty. But as her thumb curled over it, he jerked it back, mouthing, "Who shot me?" She jerked the bowl stubbornly again, but with a painful lunge he yanked it from her, flung it across the room, where it shattered against the base of the window seat. He pierced her with eyes which knew no end of rage. His face went livid as he was forced to use the voice that cut his throat to ribbons.

"Goddamn you, bitch! Was it you!" he croaked.

Oh, the pain! The pain! He clutched his throat as she jumped back, squeezing both hands before her while two spots of color appeared in her cheeks. Never in her life had anyone spoken to Miss Abigail McKenzie in such a manner. To think she had nursed this… this baboon and struggled to get him to awaken, to speak, only to be cursed at, called a bitch, and accused of being the one who shot him! She drew her mouth into a disdainful pucker, but before she could say anything more, the alarmed voice of David Melcher rang through the house.

"Miss Abigail! Miss Abigail! Are you all right down there?"

"Who's that!" the rasping voice demanded.

It gave her immense pleasure to answer him at last. "That, sir, is the man who shot you!"

Before her answer could sink in, the voice came again. "Did that animal try to harm you?"

She scurried out, presumably to the bottom of the steps. "I'm fine, Mr Melcher, now go back to bed. I just had an accident with a soup bowl."

Melcher? Who the hell was this Melcher to call him an animal? And why did she lie about the soup bowl?

She came back in and knelt to pick up the broken pieces. He longed to hurl questions at her, to jump up and shake her, make her fill in the blanks, but he hurt everywhere now from throwing the damn bowl. All he could do was glare at her while she came to stand beside the bed with a supercilious attitude.

"Cursing, Mr. Cameron, is a crutch for the dim-witted. Furthermore, I am not a bitch, but if I were, perhaps I
would
shoot you to put you out of your own self-inflicted misery and to be rid of you. I, unlike you, am civilized, thus I shall only stand back and hope that you will choke to death!" She punctuated this statement by dropping the broken china on the tray with a clatter. But before she left, she plagued him further by dropping one last morsel, just enough to rouse a thousand unaskable questions.