Randolph appeared both confused by the situation and angry at the distraction from the other room.
“I’m dying in here.” Rex was sobbing now. “I’m in pain. And not one of you bastards will help me. Please, at least give me something for the pain. P-l-e-a-s-e. God, it hurts.”
At last Randolph seemed to make up his mind. He waved his gun toward the door. “All of you, in there. Now.”
Rex was wailing. “I’m in pain.” He moaned. “I’m bleeding bad.” He sounded pathetic. “I’m dying.” He implored piteously. “Help me!”
The hostages hastened into the dimly lit room. “You women sit over there.” Again Randolph motioned with his weapon, this time toward the settee across from the bed.
The first thing Buck noted was that Rex’s stump really was bleeding.
“Doc,” Randolph shouted impatiently over the keening of the man sprawled on the bloody sheets, “Shut him up quick or I will.”
Buck hated turning his back on his adversary, but he had no choice. He was leaning over his patient when Ruth moaned, “All that blood. I . . . I think I . . . I’m going to faint.”
Over his shoulder, Buck saw the elderly woman sway and Sarah grab her under the arms. “Let me help you, Momma.” She seated her on the settee.
Ruth placed the back of her wrist dramatically on her forehead and mumbled. “That bloody stump . . .”
While Randolph’s attention was diverted to the two women, Buck reached under the covers. He started to turn when Sarah screamed, “No-o-o.”
Like a tiger, she leapt to the man standing in the middle of the room and reached for his arm. Two shots rang out simultaneously.
#
When the smoke cleared, the body of Randolph Drexel lay in a pool of blood in the middle of Ruth Greenwald’s back sitting room.
Sarah stared at it, her pulse hammering in her ears. Or was it the reverberations of the gunshots? How strange that Randolph should look so calm, so relaxed, so still. She had betrothed herself to this man, promised to love, honor and obey him, and for a few months she had felt not quite love but at least affection for him. He had given her a baby. Then he’d taken it away. Affection had turned to pain and loathing and finally hatred. What she’d feared most was that he’d also destroyed her capacity to love.
Until Dr. Thomson appeared in her life. Buck made her feel what she’d never experienced before, certainly not with Randolph—a bond, a union of spirits. Without realizing it she’d found love, not the kind that consumed but the kind that fulfilled.
Buck’s expression was subdued as he placed his fingers on the neck of the human form on the floor.
“This time he really is dead,” he announced somberly.
Sarah felt an arm tug at her waist, looked over and saw her mother’s stoic face.
“It’s as it should be, my dear. When the righteous in a man departs, evil enters.”
Sarah threw herself into her mother’s arms. “I tried to love him, Momma. Truly, but—”
“He didn’t deserve your love, sweetheart, and never appreciated what he couldn’t give himself. Let Him who is Eternal judge his merits, and let us move on with our lives.” Ruth led her daughter to the settee and sat beside her. They squeezed each other’s hands.
#
A .44 caliber hole was centered directly over the heart of Randolph Drexel. Buck wondered if Sarah’s husband had known of Buck’s reputation with firearms and if it made any difference. He gazed down at the corpse. He’d just killed another man, but as with the others, he felt no regret. This man too had deserved to die.
He surveyed the room. The smell of gun powder hung heavy in the smoky air. Had Sarah not bolted when she had and struck Randolph’s gun arm, Buck might be a cadaver on the floor as well. She’d saved
his life. Again. Not just physically. But they could discuss all that later. At the moment he had a more critical situation to attend to. He rushed over to the bed.
“You certainly played your part well,” he said, raising Rex’s bloody stump from the soaked sheet. “I never realized you were such a good actor. But why the hell are you bleeding? You weren’t when I left the room.”
“Acting?” Rex arched his back and spoke through gritted teeth. “The pain isn’t an act, doctor. I pulled out one of your neat little stitches, and let me tell you, it hurts like hell.”
“I’ll get you some laudanum.” Buck looked around. The flask, which had already been nearly empty, lay on the floor, the last of its contents forming a small puddle on the polished hardwood beside the oriental carpet. He looked to the parlor table where he’d earlier placed a fresh supply.
Sarah climbed to her feet. “Let me help.”
“You don’t need to,” he told her.
“Yes, I do.” Her first step was unsteady, but then she visibly steeled herself and moved forward with determination. “The two of you saved my life. I owe you both more than I can ever repay.” She retrieved the fallen spoon, wiped it with her fingers and collected one of the uncorked flasks from the table. “You must be in agony, Rex. I’m so sorry.”
“Not as much as you might think,” he answered in an attempt at humor. “Screaming and yelling tends to take one’s mind off pain. Maybe that’s why we do it.”
She gave him a generous spoonful of the medicine. He settled back, more relaxed, though the narcotic hadn’t yet had a chance to take effect. As soon as it did, Buck more carefully examined the torn suture.
“For God sakes, why did you pull out the stitch?”
Still clenching his jaw, Rex replied. “I was hoping the bastard might be distracted by the sight of my bloody stump. I certainly didn’t expect Ruth to be squeamish and faint.”
“Momma? Squeamish?” Sarah asked in a mocking tone. “Not in my lifetime.”
The older woman moved up behind her daughter. “I’ve probably seen almost as much blood as the doctor here. I was the one who was acting.”
“You fooled me, Mrs. Greenwald.” Buck removed his suture kit from the canvas bag in which he’d stored the laudanum. “You should consider a thespian career.”
“Actually, doctor, in my youth I appeared for an entire season on the stage of the Dock Street Theater, once with Junius Booth.”
“Momma, you never told me you knew the Booths.”
“It was a long time ago, my dear, and I don’t intend to ever mention it again, not after what his son John Wilkes did.”
“While we’re waiting for the laudanum to take effect,” Buck said, looking back over his shoulder, “I’ll attend to . . .”
Everyone followed his gaze to the cadaver on the floor behind them.
Buck knelt beside the body and aligned it parallel with the edges of the oriental rug. He’d just killed the husband of the woman he loved.
When he’d finished rolling up the dead man, he returned to his patient, replaced the suture and bandaged the amputation.
“This time,” he told Rex, “please leave my neat little stitches alone, will you?”
His words slurred from the narcotic, the man in the bed replied, “I will if you promise to keep out the riffraff.” Glassy-eyed he gazed up at Ruth. “I’m sorry about the hole in your wall.”
“Pish.” She patted his shoulder maternally. “I think I’ll leave it there as a souvenir.”
Pounding came from the cellar door.
“Mercy.” Ruth clucked her tongue. “I forgot about Duncan and Rosie.” She walked briskly to the staircase portal and opened it.
The butler came out first, looking bewildered, then relieved.
Rosie crept out behind him. “Sweet Jesus, Miz Greenwald, I feared you was all dead.” She looked through the doorway, saw the boots sticking out of the rolled carpet, and with a gasp clutched her folded hands to her chest.