Vivid (14 page)

Nate considered slipping out of the room
before anyone noticed, but he knew they'd find him. He had absolutely no
intention of playing nursemaid to the doctor, but lately his intentions hadn't
much mattered. First Abigail and her damned contract, and now this. Arguing
that he was too busy or had commitments elsewhere would not be a deterrent to
them; once the Quilt Ladies took something by the bit you had to join them or be
run down.

But he had to try. "Ladies, you know
how busy the Grove keeps me. I doubt I will have—''

“Nathaniel Grayson, are you saying you are
too busy to be concerned about this young woman's reputation?" Caroline
asked.

"No, Caroline, that's not what I'm
saying. I—"

"Good," said Poppy. "We
knew you'd agree."

Vivid hadn't agreed, however. "I
still don't believe all this is necessary."

"Dear, a woman without a reputation
is no woman at all," Caroline pointed out sternly.

Vivid felt as if she'd been chastised by
one of her great aunts. "But—"

"So are we all agreed?" Caroline
asked.

They were.

Vivid sighed in surrender.

"Welcome to Grayson Grove, Dr.
Lancaster."

On the ride home, Nate swore he could feel
the steam wafting off her small body. He didn't think she could get any angrier
than she'd been when she shot his hat off, but apparently he'd been wrong.
She'd gone absolutely stone-still when the ladies suggested installing a man in
her office. Her face registered shock, then surprise, then outrage in less than
a blink. At the time, he'd almost laughed but thought better of it once she
showed him the fire in her eyes. After all, she'd already taken a rifle to him
once that week; he didn't want to find out the shot through his hat had been
one of luck and not skill.

"You stepped into a real bear trap
back there, Lancaster."

"I'm not speaking to you," she
said.

He couldn't mask his humor.
"No?" he asked, peering over at her and that saucy little hat.

"No," she repeated.

"May I ask why?"

"Because this is all your fault. If
you had stood up to them, we wouldn't be in this ridiculous situation."

"I tried. You heard me."

"I heard you surrendering. I do not
need a man in my office to protect my honor."

He glanced over at her angry face.
"Do you want to shoot me?"

"The thought had crossed my mind.
Maybe later."

He shook his head again. Lord, what a
woman. He'd almost felt sorry for her back there. He knew how controlling
Caroline could be and Lancaster hadn't known she'd stepped into a trap until
the jaws snapped shut. She'd been a lamb among wolves.

Initially, Nate had been angry, too, at
the ladies' decision, mainly because he'd stepped into the same trap. These
manipulative episodes were becoming a bit too commonplace for his liking. First
his Aunt Gail and Miss Edna and now the Quilt Ladies had turned against him to
try to force his hand regarding the doctor. The women were a cross that the men
of the Grove seemed destined to bear. Their small community had been blessed,
or cursed, depending upon the point of view, with women who were not only
intelligent, but educated. When the Grove was founded, his grandmother Dorcas
made it the law that every child, male and female, must learn to read. As a
result, some of the women who'd married men from outside their community could
think circles around their husbands, a situation many of these men found
outrageous. But what could Nate do? He certainly couldn't threaten to lock them
away unless they began to mimic the docile, barely literate women of other
communities, as suggested by one husband during last month's Men's Association
meeting. Who knew the ramifications that might bring? The women owned many of
the businesses, oftimes they voted as a bloc on Grove affairs, and generally
they had their way when they wanted it. According to legend, during his
grandfather's day the men once tried to rein in their wives. It resulted in a
disaster so cataclysmic that even today Nate could not get any of the elder men
to discuss what had transpired. The women won, that was all Nate and his contemporaries
knew.

Yet while he hadn't been pleased by this
afternoon's outcome, once he calmed down he realized how much he enjoyed having
Lancaster beside him, mad as hell at this unexpected turn of events, and that
made him smile.

Vivid kept telling herself this was a
small town, reputations meant everything, especially to a woman practicing
medicine. It didn't help. She continued to believe that Nate could have done
something to bring about a more rational outcome, regardless of his
protestations. Wasn't he supposed to be the authority in this town? She'd just
resigned herself to having her new office only a few doors from his own, and
now the Crazy Quilt Ladies had made the man a member of her staff. She glanced
over and saw him smiling. "I fail to see the humor in this, Mr.
Grayson."

"Depends on your point of view,"
he replied.

Admittedly, Vivid had only one point of
view. “You should have told them you were unable to comply."

"I tried. We already had this
conversation, remember?"

"You should have been more
forceful."

He grinned. "Your piano playing was
forceful enough, Miss Bach."

Vivid stiffened and whirled to face him.

Her outrage would have warned off a less
confident man, but Nate looked into her flashing eyes and stated, "The
next time you're invited to play, before you begin, give me a moment to tiptoe
out of the room first. Okay?"

Vivid knew she was supposed to be angry
with him. She knew that for that remark he deserved a blistering lecture on his
duty as a gentleman, but she remembered pounding away at that piano and
succumbed to the sparkle in his eyes. "It was a pretty atrocious display,
wasn't it?"

"Nothing pretty about it at
all," Nate replied. "And you said you took lessons?"

"Yes," Vivid stated with mock
pride. "Believe me or not, I did, every Wednesday afternoon following
school. The teacher's name was Madam Henry, and if you struck a wrong note,
she'd smack you across the knuckles with a baton. I wished her to perdition
many times. So if I play badly, it is Madam's fault, not mine."

“Glad to see you can laugh at yourself.
Many people can't."

Vivid held his gaze a moment, then looked
away, her confidence suddenly overcome by the odd sensations she was feeling.

Nate enjoyed seeing nervous shyness take
hold of her because it afforded him a glimpse of the woman she kept locked
away. She'd given him a fascinating peek at that facet of herself last night
during their conversation in her cabin about a man pleasing a woman. She'd
stammered like a virgin bride in response to his words and it was not the
reaction he'd expected.

However, she'd conducted herself well this
afternoon. The ladies were a major hurdle. Everyone knew they could be as
touchy as a nest of hornets, and there were no guarantees they'd continue to
offer the doctor their support, but she'd passed their tests with flying
colors. Her manners were stellar. Nate noticed that even Brenna had begun to
imitate the way Lancaster held her head and the way she raised her cup to her
lips. Watching her conduct herself with such decorum and grace made him wonder
once again how someone so elegant expected to survive in such a place as this.
"If it will make you feel any better, you probably won't be needing me at
your office."

"Oh, splendid, you're going to ignore
their edict. Mr. Grayson, thank you so—"

He looked into her dark eyes. "Hold
on a minute. Don't get me wrong, I will be abiding by the ladies' decision
because I don't want them camped in my doorway until I do. You won't be needing
me because the men won't be seeking you out."

Vivid searched his face. "I don't
understand."

"They're going to wait for the
circuit doctor to handle their complaints."

Vivid stared. "And this is supposed
to make me feel better? Why won't they come to me?"

She didn't really need the answer. She
knew. She sat back against the bench and for a moment couldn't speak. Finally,
she asked, "Will they keep their wives and children away also?"

"Some will."

"How do you know this?"

"From listening to the talk down at
the mill and out on the farms. You're a female; some see nothing else."

"And you, is that all you see?"

Nate sighed. Another one of her pointed
questions. "You've only been here three days, Lancaster."

"Yet three days is all the men around
here need to keep their wives and children from seeking trained care."

Nate didn't respond.

"I suppose it would be silly of me to
believe you've stayed neutral in all this?"

"Now there you're wrong," Nate
countered, looking her way. "I've made it my business to let folks decide
on their own."

Vivid held his eyes. "Then I apologize."

"Apology accepted."

He thought it only fair she know which way
the wind blew. As he'd predicted, folks were already choosing sides.
Unfortunately, the lines were being drawn mainly by gender. Women on one side,
men on the other. Adam Crowley, a boyhood friend of Nate's late father and the
man Aunt Gail deemed the bane of her existence, wanted Gail to be censured. He
said she'd overstepped her bounds by bringing in an untrained young female
without council approval. Abigail had been charged to search for a doctor, and
while no one denied her judgment, no one had expected a female, either.

Yet here she sat, and Nate had given her
permission to stay, albeit temporarily.

"When will my office be ready?"
she asked, refusing to let him see how devastating his revelation had been to
her spirit. A big part of her wanted to run home to California and wail in her
mama's arms. Didn't these men know anything about dreams?

"I really don't know. I'm having
trouble finding someone to take the job since everybody's planting." Nate
could see that she was upset by the men's plans and was surprised by how
disturbed he felt. For the past three days she'd had enough inner fire to fuel
a train's engine, but it appeared as if the flame had been suddenly
extinguished. She stared out over the roadside with distant eyes.

"Would it be agreeable for me to do
the work myself?"

He looked over at her, and before he could
open his mouth, she warned softly, "If you say anything about my ability
to clean I will shoot you right now, not later."

He inclined his head politely. "Pax,
madam. I will give you the keys whenever it is convenient."

"Thank you, I'd like to begin first
thing in the morning."

Later that evening, as Vivid sat in the
chair in her front room watching the shadows chase away the last bit of day,
she fought off the feelings of melancholy. She'd known coming to this place and
proving herself would be a challenge and she'd anticipated some resistance, but
she'd never envisioned anyone mounting a campaign against her. Had she really
been as naive as Nate Grayson accused on the day they met? Had she taken it for
granted folks would be so grateful for good sound medical treatment that they
wouldn't care what she looked like beneath her clothes?

Maybe she had, but she still didn't want
it to be true. The race needed women like herself stretching the lines of both
gender and race, especially now when the country seemed bent upon moving back
and not forward. These were frightening times and even more horror lay ahead if
the political climate continued to play true. Every advance the race made was
necessary if it was to survive. More women like Maria W. Stewart were needed,
not fewer. In 1832 Miss Stewart, a Black woman, became the first American woman
of any race to lecture to public audiences. And there was Mary Shadd, who in
1853 grew tired of being vilified in Henry Bibb's Black abolitionist weekly,
The
Voice of the Fugitive,
and so founded
The Provincial Freeman
in
response. By doing so she became one of the first women, and the first Black
woman on the North American continent, to edit and publish a newspaper. Vivid
herself owed a tremendous debt to another pioneering Black woman, Miss Rebecca
Lee. Fifteen years after Elizabeth Blackwell became the first American woman to
gain a degree in medicine, Rebecca Lee received hers from the New England
Medical College. Had Miss Lee not pursued her dream, Vivid might not have been
afforded the opportunity to succeed on her own.

Those women and many thousands like them
had uplifted not only the race but the country as well, and just like Vivid
they had to defend themselves from small minds and the rocks thrown at them by
opposers in order to carve out their niche. When Mary Shadd published her first
edition, she thought it best her name not be placed on the masthead of her own
newspaper for fear the men in the abolitionist movement would not take her
editorials seriously. Poor Maria Stewart caused such an uproar with her ringing
antislavery speeches, she was driven from her home city of Boston. Yet these
women did not give up.