Doc Read online

  Bat untied his horse, put a foot in the stirrup, and stretched for the pommel. Hopping twice, he swung up, and looked down. “You gonna do something about this?” he asked, glancing back toward the trampled grass and the smoldering torches.

  Wyatt’s eyes stayed level, but something Bat said must have gotten through to him.

  “Not my jurisdiction,” he said.

  Bat nodded: acknowledgment, not thanks. He gathered the reins and wheeled the horse twice. “Watch your back,” he told Wyatt before he rode away. “And think hard about who your real friends are!”

  Late in the summer of ’78, a little epidemic swept through Dodge City. People speculated that a drummer from St. Louis brought it in on the train. It was only a cold but it was a bad one, and pretty much everybody in Dodge suffered through it before the sickness ran its course.

  Wilfred Eberhardt probably caught it from one of the Riney boys, and no question: Wil was the one who gave it to Doc Holliday and Belle Wright. The boy felt awful about that. Rather than harm the two people on earth who had been kindest to him since he was orphaned, young Mr. Eberhardt would have marched his manly little self out onto the prairie and died alone, but he didn’t even know he was getting sick until he sneezed right into Doc’s face. That wasn’t good manners, but Doc wasn’t the kind to get angry with a sick child. The dentist gave Wil a nice new handkerchief, and taught him how to use it, and told him to go on home now, and come back when he was all better.

  When Wilfred got in from Dr. Holliday’s office, Miss Belle took one look at the boy and put him straight to bed. That was when Wil discovered that it wasn’t entirely bad, being sick. Doc still paid him a dime a day. And Miss Belle brought him tea with honey and read stories to him until she got sick herself.

  Isabelle Wright was genuinely fond of Wilfred, a winning child with a streak of appealing sadness under his resolve not to be a bother to anyone. In addition, of course, every moment she spent caring for the Eberhardt children did double duty, for it rubbed her father’s face in what she considered his callous exploitation of the German farmers in the area. On the other hand, if Belle had known just how sick she was going to get, she might have asked her mother to take care of Wilfred. Not that it would have changed anything. If Belle hadn’t caught the cold from Wil, she’d have gotten it from one of her own brothers, or from a customer in the store, or from somebody at church.

  Being out on the open prairie for twelve weeks at a time was hardship enough without adding a sore throat, a thick head, and a dripping nose to the exercise, so it was a mercy that Alexander von Angensperg was out in the countryside while the cold was making the rounds. Most Dodge Citians were over the illness when he got back to town.

  Alex was hoping to see Wyatt Earp before heading toward Wichita on the northern arc of the circuit, but when the little huddle of wooden buildings came into sight, he realized that for all its ugly, violent, noisy crudity, Dodge City had come to represent to him agreeable company and convivial conversation. Approaching the place now felt strangely like a homecoming.

  He tied Alphonsus to the hitching rail in front of Dodge House, thinking to see Doc in his office between patients, but before he could go inside, he heard boots clomping along the boardwalk and a familiar voice behind him.

  “Staying longer this time?” Morgan Earp called genially.

  “Today only, I fear,” Alexander told him, accustomed now to the way Americans omitted conversational hors d’oeuvres. “Is Wyatt back from Topeka, or have I missed him once again?”

  “You caught him dead to rights this time!” Morg jerked a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the jail. “He’s just finishing the reports with Fat Larry—There he is! Hey, Wyatt, wait up! Look who’s here!”

  Jogging across the street, Morgan came to rest beside his brother and turned back toward the priest, grinning happily. “See, Alex? I told you people mix us up all the time!”

  And indeed they were very like in appearance. Fair, square-jawed, broad-shouldered, and lean, with hardly a hair of separation in their height. Their differences, Alexander noted, were all in their bearing. Where Morgan was amiable and open, Wyatt seemed guarded, though not unfriendly.

  After a few awkward remarks about Johnnie Sanders, he and Wyatt found themselves with nothing more to say. It was Morgan who suggested that the three of them go visit Doc, who was not in his office after all. “He’s been poorly,” Morg explained, leading the way toward a short side street lined with a few small, neat houses set on fenced-in patches of bare ground.

  “But—he looked so well when I saw him last!” Alexander said uneasily.

  “Just a cold,” said Wyatt.

  “Yeah, bad one’s been going around,” added Morg. “That’s my house, right there, and that’s Wyatt’s—”

  “They’re not ours,” Wyatt said.

  “We rent,” Morg admitted easily. He gestured toward the third of five small frame dwellings. “That’s where Doc and Kate live.” Taking Wyatt’s point, he added, “They rent, too.”

  Jau Dong-Sing was stepping out onto the front porch with Kate, and with the door open, they could hear Doc’s ugly, hacking cough.

  “It’s like that night and day,” Morg told Alex quietly. “I don’t know how Kate stands it!”

  “All she has to do is listen,” Wyatt said. “It’s Doc who’s sick.”

  “You Doc’s guest!” China Joe cried, recognizing Alex. “Where you stay? You want bath? I bring plenty hot water. Doc, he very no good, but I bring more medicine, fix his chi!”

  “That shit’s disgusting,” Kate muttered, not caring that China Joe was standing right next to her. “I can’t even stay in the house when Doc drinks it.” Red-eyed with sleeplessness, she glared at Alexander. “He ain’t dying! He don’t need no priest!”

  “It’s just a social call,” Morg told her. “Alex is leaving for Wichita again, and—”

  “Kate, you look exhausted,” Alexander said softly. “This is not a good time for a visit. We’ll let you and Doc get some rest—”

  “Too late now!”

  The voice was hoarse but cheerful. Still tying the narrow belt of a silk robe around a waist as slender as a girl’s, Doc appeared in the doorway, his smile fading when he saw the open shock on von Angensperg’s face.

  “You make a sobering mirror, sir,” he said, but he waved off Kate’s worry and the priest’s concern, insisting that he was fine, just a little slow to get back on his feet. Thanking Mr. Jau for his concern and bidding him a good day, Doc urged the others to come on in and keep him company for a spell, and asked if anyone would like tea, or something stronger.

  He sat down in a corner chair, breathless and white, while Kate sullenly did the honors, but perked up considerably as the conversation became livelier, for visitors always cheered him.

  “I do believe I am hungry,” he announced with some surprise. “First time in days! You see, darlin’?” he asked Kate, as though reminding her of some point he’d made before. “Why don’t y’all go on over to Delmonico’s for steak and eggs?” he suggested. “I’ll make myself decent and meet you there directly.”

  Kate didn’t argue, but it was obvious that she wanted to. Doc told her he was tired to death of being in bed and declared that it would do him a world of good to get out of the house, then shooed them all out so he could dress.

  Hobbling into the restaurant nearly an hour later, he explained his limp away, saying that bed rest had aggravated an old injury. He sat down heavily, looking exhausted, but called, “Miss Nora—?”

  Then the coughing fit took over.

  Around the restaurant, strangers’ mouths twisted in disgust at the sound. The cough had changed, Alexander realized. It was deeper, wetter. Morgan looked away, wincing, and Kate raised her eyebrows as if to say, “See? I told you so.” Presently, Nora appeared with a tray bearing Doc’s usual tea and honey, along with a bottle of bourbon. Instead of a shot glass, however, she supplied Doc with a tumbler, and this he filled halfway.
>
  With a silent, steady effort, he got it down in something under a minute, his face losing some of the tension that became noticeable only when it eased off, right before their eyes.

  “Doc,” Wyatt asked uneasily, “when did you start drinking that much?”

  “Wyatt, I’m not drinkin’ more,” Doc assured him with that crooked smile of his. “I’m just pourin’ less.”

  “I fear you have overtaxed yourself to come here,” Alexander suggested, for Kate had asked them to help her keep Doc from overdoing it, and they all knew he would, given half a chance.

  “You should be in bed,” Morgan agreed, and not just to make Kate happier, either; but then their meals arrived at the table.

  Doc talked more than he ate, and listened more than he talked, although his brief comments were good-humored and amusing. Sitting slightly behind him, Kate was silent and didn’t touch her food. As soon as she thought Doc was too tired to balk, she made a signal to the priest. Alexander stood with an excuse about needing to get on the road before noon.

  Doc waved to Nora and asked her to put the bill on his tab. Wyatt insisted on paying his own way, and so did Morgan. They were still working out who owed what when Isabelle Wright came into the restaurant and walked straight to their table.

  All the men stood, even Doc, who would have made an honest effort to rise from his deathbed for a lady. Belle looked peaked, her nose red and raw. She only managed to say good morning to everyone, including “Mrs. Holliday,” before her face took on an inward, wary, weary look and she dug quickly in her little purse for a crumpled handkerchief edged with tatting. The rattling cough came from deep within her narrow chest.

  Doc pulled out a chair for her and poured a little bourbon. “Miss Isabelle,” he said with quiet commiseration, “I do believe we are sufferin’ from the same malady!” Alexander looked up sharply, but Doc said merely, “You have some congestion left over from that wretched cold.”

  Eyes watering, Belle nodded silently and sipped from the glass he’d pressed into her hand. Although she grimaced at the liquor’s taste, its warmth worked quickly, and her chest felt remarkably better. “A little bronchitis,” she said then, smiling wanly. “I just can’t seem to shake it!”

  Doc’s face went slack: something about what she had just said … Alexander watched, waiting for the blow to land. When it did, Doc blinked once before he returned his gaze to the girl and produced a mild smile.

  Unaware of his effort, Belle was still talking. “I imagine we both got the cold from Wilfred,” she said, “but everyone’s been coughing and sneezing.” She looked at the priest then. “I heard you were back in town, sir. I wanted you to know that I went through the accounts after your visit, and I found Johnnie’s money. He booked five thousand, two hundred and fifty-seven dollars over six months. He withdrew two thousand just before he died. That leaves a little over thirty-two hundred dollars. The cash is still in Daddy’s safe,” she said bitterly. “He probably expected to keep it.”

  Wyatt’s mouth had dropped. Morgan’s face was alight. Doc coughed, eyes bright over the cotton cloth in his hand.

  Before any of them could say a word, Belle continued, “If you’ll give me an address, sir, I’ll send a wire transfer to St. Francis, but I don’t want the money to go to that pope person—”

  Suddenly silent, she held her face still. The others, even Kate, waited respectfully while Isabelle Wright fought tears, for she had spent many hours studying columns of numbers in Johnnie’s terrible handwriting and had stopped often to recall his unexpected remarks, his interesting ideas and wry observations. Ten days spent in bed with a bad cold and a good book had made Belle newly aware of what a good friend Johnnie Sanders had been and of how often she still wished that the two of them could share something notable she’d just read.

  Eyes brimming, Belle raised her head and straightened her back. “I think that you should use Johnnie’s money to build a library for your school,” she told the priest firmly. “I would be honored to donate my books to begin it.”

  To a man, they were stunned by Belle’s notion.

  The priest was delighted, naturally, and thanked her for her generosity and for her excellent suggestion. He did not notice that Morgan was crestfallen, for that cash was his brother’s, but what could Wyatt say? It’s mine. I want to buy a horse. And Doc felt punished for his pride, for he had guessed correctly and located the money but had never anticipated this. Compassion and apology mixed in his eyes, brows lifted in inquiry, he looked at Wyatt: Do you want me to say something?

  Wyatt let out a small, hopeless breath and shook his head slightly. He stood to go, dropping two bits on the table to pay his share of the bill.

  “Johnnie was a real good reader,” he told von Angensperg. “Name the liberry after him.”

  “It is a fine legacy for a boy who died too young,” the priest said, standing to shake Wyatt’s hand. “John Horse Sanders will be remembered.”

  No Help

  Kate knew his tricks. Doc would stop to have her roll him a cigarette, or pause to comment on a brawl spilling onto the street, or decide he wanted to study the clouds for signs of rain. Getting back to the house from Delmonico’s took most of an hour. You don’t fool me none, she wanted to tell him, but a presumption of strength was the only thing John Henry Holliday asked of her and that, by God, is what she gave him.

  Six months of overwork had undermined him. A simple cold had damn near killed him. The chest pain was so bad, he needed laudanum to dull it. Even so, she couldn’t get him into bed. Hunched in his chair, elbows on his knees, staring at the cheap floral carpet, Doc didn’t even lift his head to mumble, “Kate. Please. Jus’ do as I ask.”

  “But why? Is it your father’s money? Doc, you don’t even like your father!”

  He shook his head slightly.

  “Then why bother? Grier ain’t worth your time!”

  “Don’ care.”

  “You ain’t making sense,” she informed him, folding her arms. “And anyways, what good is it to beat him? His credit’s no good.”

  “Doesn’ matter.”

  This is fever, she decided. Hoping he’d lose interest if she delayed the game, she threw up her hands. “All right! Whatever you say, but I need time to set it up.”

  “Get Bob Wright, too.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “You ain’t serious,” she scoffed.

  Slate blue eyes rose, humorless and unblinking.

  “Doc,” she said cautiously, “Bob Wright’s good. You can’t play him! Hell, you shouldn’t play at all, not like this …”

  As his rebuttal he held out a handkerchief streaked with bright arterial red. When he spoke, his voice was soft and empty of drama. “ ’S now or never, darlin’.”

  The argument went on, but nothing Kate said made a difference, for Doc’s logic was impeccable if unspoken. It was his dispassionate clinical judgment that he would not live to see his twenty-seventh Christmas. Why hold back? What was left to him but one last grand gesture?

  On the fifth of September 1878, it came down to this. Kate had made him a promise. He held her to it.

  Later she would rage at him, at his stupidity and arrogance and pride. She would swear that if she’d known what he intended, she never would have agreed to help. “Too late now” was all he’d say, but he would say it to her back, as she left him.

  “I’m putting a game together,” Kate told Elijah Garrett Grier in mid-September. “Stud poker. Twenty-dollar ante. No limit. You in?”

  Naturally, he hesitated, for he simply didn’t trust her. Twice that summer, Eli had complained to Bessie Earp about the Hungarian hooker, but Bessie only shrugged and looked at her husband.

  “Katie runs her own business,” James told the captain. “The house just takes a cut for laundry and the room.” Kate came and went whenever she pleased, James explained, and did what she liked with whoever caught her eye. “My opinion?” James offered. “That’s what customers like about her.”

  Maybe s
o, for she wasn’t that pretty, and she sure as hell didn’t flatter a man. Whatever the reason, Eli Grier wanted her, but the bitch just toyed with him. Once, back in July, when he thought the deal was made, she fixed him with that flat-eyed stare of hers. Breasts half-exposed by negligent lace, she leaned toward him with a feral grin, letting him breathe in her perfume and her musk, daring him to touch her. He reached out and as his fingers grazed that creamy flesh, he felt the barrel of a Deringer .36 press against the ribs above his heart.

  Her voice was husky, foreign, amused. “Let’s see your cash,” she whispered. “For you? I cost a grand.”

  Then, laughing, she swirled away, silk rustling, making him watch, infuriated, as she picked another man. “For you?” she cried breezily. “Five bucks!” And off she went, not even glancing over her soft, white shoulder as she led the dazzled Texan up quiet, carpeted stairs.

  “What’s the matter?” she taunted Eli now. “Game too rich for you?”

  It was, and he suspected that she knew it. Which is exactly why Elijah Grier said, “How about a side bet? I double my money, you’re mine for a night.”

  “And what do I get if you lose?” she asked, delighted.

  He’d left himself no path of retreat. “A grand,” he said.

  No woman was worth so much, but night after night, he had imagined it. What would you get from her for a thousand dollars? What could you do to her, for a thousand dollars?

  “Double that,” she dared.

  “You’re on,” he said with the careless bravado that had earned him three combat commendations and two field promotions before he was twenty-three.

  Kate sat back, sprawled on Bessie’s upholstery. Arms flung over the crest of a settee, breasts loose and lifted, she actually seemed impressed for a moment. Then, leaning toward him, she reached over to pat his thigh sympathetically and ran her hand slowly upward.

  “Tell you what,” she offered, voice low. “I’ll go home with the winner. If that’s you?” She shrugged. “But if it’s not?” She tightened her grip on him until he stopped breathing. “You’ll owe me two grand.”