The Heart Remembers (34 page)

Tharyn said, “Beth Ann and I will miss you, but you must go and perform the surgery.”

“I sure will miss you, Daddy,” Beth Ann said. “When will you be back home?”

“If all goes well with the surgery, it’ll be sometime Friday afternoon, sweetheart.”

At dawn the next morning, Tharyn kissed her husband good-bye and watched him ride away on Pal.

At noon, Dr. Dane stopped for lunch in the busy town of Vail, which was surrounded by towering mountain peaks.

In the café, he overheard two local men talking at an adjacent table. He learned that nearly all the troops from Fort Junction had been sent to the Medicine Bow Mountains area to join troops from Fort Laramie to put down the Cheyenne and Shoshone uprising. The stagecoaches running between Denver and Grand Junction would not have the normal military escorts, but the army authorities believed that since the renegade Utes were now at peace with the whites, the stagecoaches should still be safe.

After lunch, Dr. Dane mounted up and continued along the road westward. After half an hour, he rode into a small unnamed settlement and dismounted in front of a blacksmith shop, where he let Pal drink from the water trough.

While Pal was slurping water, Dr. Dane noticed a wagon pull up with one of the horses limping. On the wagon seat was a young man and his wife, who was holding a small boy, who obviously had a fever.

The man hopped out of the wagon, and Dr. Dane heard him say, “Honey, I’ll tell the blacksmith we’re in a hurry and get him to put a new shoe on immediately.”

The young woman nodded. “Please tell him we need to get Tommy to the doctor as quickly as we can. This fever is getting worse.”

As her husband hurried into the blacksmith shop, Dr. Dane
left Pal at the water trough and drew up to the wagon. “Ma’am, pardon me, but I couldn’t help but hear what you and your husband were saying. Your son has a fever?”

“Yes. We’re taking him to Dr. Bill James in Wolcott. We had to stop because one of these horses just threw a shoe.”

“I’m a doctor, ma’am. My name is Dane Logan, and I have the Logan Clinic in Central City. I’m on my way to Glenwood Springs to do hip replacement surgery on a lady there. Would you mind if I look at Tommy?”

“I’d be glad for you to look at him.” She spoke to the boy. “Tommy, this man is a doctor. He wants to have a look at you.”

Dr. Dane took the boy from his mother’s arms, helped her down from the wagon seat, and carried him to the rear of the wagon. He lowered the tailgate and laid him down. The mother stepped up close to observe.

In less than half a minute, Dr. Dane looked at the mother and said, “Ma’am, Tommy has a wood tick burrowing under his skin right here in the small of his back. I need something hot to put close to the tick’s head so it will back out from under the skin. I’m sure the blacksmith has a hot iron in his shop. Let’s take Tommy inside.”

He cradled the boy in his arms and entered the blacksmith shop with the mother on his heels.

Unbeknownst to Dr. Dane, two young men had been standing nearby, looking on, and eyeing Pal.

One said to the other, “Now’s our chance, Roger.”

“All right, Eddie. Let’s do it.”

They hurried to Pal and led him to their own horses. They mounted up, and with Roger holding Pal’s reins, trotted away.

Moments later, when Dr. Dane Logan came out of the blacksmith shop to get his medical bag, he was shocked to see that Pal was gone.

He dashed back into the shop and told the parents his horse
was missing, along with the medical bag. “I’ve got to go look for him,” he said with strain in his voice. “Tell you what. Take Tommy home and wash the spot where the tick had been in strong lye soap. That’ll prevent any infection.”

The blacksmith spoke up. “Doctor, I have some lye soap over there at the wash basin. We’ll wash the spot right here.”

“Good. I have to go now.”

The parents spoke their appreciation to him, and Dr. Dane hurried outside. He ran to the road and looked both directions. There was no sign of Pal.

He would just have to go on to Glenwood Springs, wire Dr. Tim to send him another ivory ball by stagecoach, and use Dr. Watson’s surgical instruments. Now he needed to see if he could borrow a horse from some rancher down the road.

As he started walking westward, anger welled up in him over the theft of his horse. Pal would not have just run away.

Soon he noticed dark clouds gathering in the sky ahead of him, and a wind from the west was picking up.

After the doctor had covered a couple of miles, he heard the rattling sound of harness and wheels and the pounding of hooves behind him. He looked over his shoulder and saw a stagecoach coming with the six-up team churning up dust.

As the stage drew near, Dr. Dane waved at the driver and shot-gunner. The driver drew rein, and the stage was brought to a halt.

Looking up at both men, he said, “Howdy, gentlemen. I’m Dr. Dane Logan from Central City. I was riding my horse to Glenwood Springs to perform a hip replacement surgery at the hospital there, but somebody stole my horse a few miles back. Do you have room for me? I need a ride to Glenwood Springs.”

The driver grinned. “Sure, Doctor. We have five people aboard, so there’s room for one more. We won’t charge you anything either. Hop in.”

“I’ll be glad to pay you.”

The driver shook his head. “It’s all right. The ride’s on Wells Fargo. Hop in.”

Dr. Dane thanked him, climbed inside, introduced himself to the other passengers, and commented about the oncoming storm.

One of the men said, “Could be a bad one, Dr. Logan. I’ve seen some real bad snowstorms hit these mountains before, in early fall.”

The stagecoach soon passed through the small town of Eagle. Seven miles farther down the road, it drew into the town of Gypsum. When they reached the west end of town, Dr. Dane saw a sign that told him it was now seventeen miles to Glenwood Springs.

They were some five miles west of Gypsum with the stage rolling along the narrow road with a deep canyon on their right. Suddenly the driver and shotgunner saw a band of whooping Indians coming at them on their pintos from a dense forest off to the left.

The driver hollered down to the passengers inside, as he sped up the horses. “We’ve got Cheyenne warriors coming after us!”

As the Indians drew near, they opened fire with their rifles.

The shotgunner raised his double-barreled shotgun to fire at the attackers. From inside, two of the male passengers began firing out the windows.

The Cheyennes swung onto the road behind the stage, and were coming up fast. Just as the shotgunner fired and blew an Indian off his horse with a 12-gauge blast, a bullet chewed through the rear of the coach and hit one of the women in the back of the head. She collapsed, and it took Dr. Dane only seconds to check on her and discover that she was dead.

Some of the galloping Indians drew up alongside the coach. The shotgunner used his second barrel to blast one of them off his pinto, but Cheyenne rifles barked. Both the shotgunner and the driver fell off the racing stagecoach, bouncing limply on the road.

Another Cheyenne bullet hit the lead horse on the right side of the harness. When the horse stumbled and fell, the other horses lost their footing. The stage careened over the edge of the road and plunged down into the canyon.

The Indians brought their horses to a halt and watched as the stage and team crashed at the bottom of the canyon, beside a swift-moving river. They looked at the shattered stage, the dead horses, and a couple of male bodies that were visible on the ground near the wreckage.

The Indians laughed and rode away.

In the bottom of the canyon, two teenage boys had been riding their horses along the bank of the river. They saw the plunging stagecoach, the screaming, pawing, falling horses, and the awful crash at the bottom.

When the boys drew up to the bloody sight, they looked at the male and female bodies inside the shattered coach, and the two men that lay on the ground next to the wreckage. They dismounted, and while they were stealing the men’s wallets and the women’s purses, they noticed that two of the men on the ground were breathing, though unconscious. They rode away in a hurry.

Roger and Eddie rode onto the small acreage where they lived, some five miles south of the main road. Roger was still leading the stolen horse. As they approached the cabin, Eddie cupped a hand beside his mouth and shouted to his little brother, who was watching them from a window, “Hey, Buddy, we got you a new horse!”

Fifteen-year-old Buddy came running out, while putting on his coat. When he ran up to the stolen horse, he noticed a black bag tied to the saddle. He stepped into the stirrup and swung into the saddle, telling himself he would throw the bag away later.

Pal instantly let out a shrill cry and started bucking. Buddy
flew out of the saddle and landed on the ground. The horse galloped away and quickly vanished from view.

Eddie snapped his fingers as his little brother was getting up. “Oh, well, Roger and I will find you another one.”

Nearly two hours had passed when Dr. Dane Logan first became aware of the gurgling river. He heard birds chirping above the sound of the whining wind, and tried to open his eyes. The black edge of unconsciousness swirled at the edge of his mind, attempting to pull him back where he had been.

He placed a hand to his forehead, squeezed his temples with thumb and fingers, and finally was able to force his eyes open. He felt a large knot on his forehead and felt warm moisture. He looked at his hand and realized that the knot was trickling blood.

His right knee was hurting severely. He tried to sit up, and when he did, he passed out and fell back to the soft ground of the riverbank.

A short time later, he regained consciousness again, and once more, sat up. His brain started to swirl. He closed his eyes and let his mind clear.

He opened his eyes again and looked around him. A man that lay near him was unconscious, but breathing. He became aware that the heavy clouds above were lightly spitting snow, which was being swirled around by the wind.

Dr. Dane rose painfully to his feet and limped toward the wrecked stagecoach, noticing that the horses were dead. He looked inside the wreckage. Just like the horses, the men and women inside were dead.

He staggered back to the man who lay close to where he had lain, and looked down at him. The man was breathing no more.

Dr. Dane noted a small pool of water next to the river. He limped to it, and lay down to splash water on his face.

The image that was reflected back to him caused him to jerk his head. The man whose face he saw was a stranger! He moved his head slightly to make sure it was
his
reflection.

Nothing about his own reflection was familiar. How could he not know his own face?

He blinked and wet his lips with his tongue.
Who am I? What am I? Do I have a family? Where is home? Where am I right now?
He could answer none of those questions.

He reached to his left hip pocket for his wallet. It was gone. He tried the other hip pocket, and when he found it empty, he patted his coat pockets. No wallet. No identification.

He sat down on the ground and examined the painful knee. After squeezing it and bending his leg back and forth, he said aloud, “It’s only a sprain. It’ll heal quickly.”

His pulse thudded in his ears. “How do I know that?” he asked himself aloud.

He limped back to the wreckage of the stagecoach and searched among the bodies, but every wallet and purse was gone. He went to the man who had been breathing earlier and went through his pockets. No wallet.

As snowflakes struck his face, driven by the wind, he palmed them away and said, “Dear Lord, I need Your help. I—” He gasped. “I remember I’m a born-again Christian! Jesus is my Saviour!”

Scripture verses began coming to mind. Aloud, he said to himself, “Why can I remember these Scriptures, and that I am a Christian … but not remember who I am or what my occupation is?”

Another Scripture came to mind.
Thy word have I hid in mine heart that I might not sin against thee
.

He shook his head. “Heart. Heart. Heart.”

More Scripture scratched at his memory.
Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life
.

He shook his head again. “Heart. Heart. What is it about that word?”

Suddenly a voice that seemed familiar echoed in his head: “The heart remembers things the mind forgets.”

Again, Scriptures ran through his mind:
Thy word have I hid in mine heart … Keep thy heart with all diligence …

He tried again to remember his name.

Nothing.

Do I have a family?

Nothing.

Where is home?

Nothing.

I had to have been on that stagecoach. But I don’t remember being on it
.

He wiped more snowflakes from his face. “Lord, You know who I am, and You know the answers to these questions. Please help me.”

Dane realized that it was snowing harder. The wind was stronger, too. He looked up toward the top of the canyon. There was what looked like a trail, winding its way to the top, but it was covered with snow.

He limped toward the trail and started climbing.

The wind-driven snow was partly blinding him, and the steep trail was slippery, but he kept struggling upward. He continued to slip and slide, and his knee burned with pain. At one point, he stopped to catch his breath, then continued to fight his way upward. After stopping to catch his breath a few more times, he looked up and saw that he was only a few feet from the top.

He summoned all his strength, and seconds later gained level ground. Rising to his feet in the snow, he ran his gaze around, and finally made out what appeared to be a road. Hunching his shoulders against the frigid wind, and wiping snow from his eyes, he began walking eastward.

After a while, he saw a sign lightly coated with snow, but he
could read it. The sign told him it was five miles to Gypsum.

His heart pounded. The town’s name was familiar!

Moments later, a rancher came along the road behind him and pulled up beside him. “Looks like you could use a ride, mister.”