Yankton

Chapter 40

Chapter 40 The Desperate Hours

It was hard convincing Montana that she was number one in my book, and that Klara wasn't moving in on her. From what I caught from not only her, but Maggie, Sockie, and Kitty, the kind of men available to them were all rats, two timers, and double dealers. Now I'm no saint, but I've always believed in treating others, especially woman fairly. I knew that all the women here at Purgatory were closely watching Mark Craig, and I, so at least Mark and I "walked the line." As I mentioned before, Craig had his own thing going with Maggie and Kitty, but that was their business, and I didn't ask, all I knew was that you never said a bad word about Craig if one or both of them were present.

For the time being, Klara ran our convenience store during the day, and apprenticed at Montana's Faro table, as I showed her the "ropes," she became quite curious about the sorts of things I was looking for in trade. I gave her a list of items I would trade for or pay well,

"Any Indian items, such as guns, clothing, and equipment. First edition books especially from authors like Dickens, Austin, Poe, Hawthorne, or Cooper. Any Civil war artifacts rated high as well, especially Confederate belts buckles, swords, knives, or equipment."

"You certainly have a rather unusual list here," she said,

"Well I have my reasons," I replied, "You'll figure it out soon enough."

About a week after Klara joined us, Colin was shot.

It was around nine o-clock at night; we had an unusually large number of customers that night, and a lot of strangers. I had just got done playing my guitar and singing a few Marty Robbins songs and was taking a break at the employee table. Sitting there as well was Oliver Whitworth, the English remittance man who had become one of our regulars. Since he was English, Colin didn't care for him all that well, so was up on our little stage picking tunes on his banjo. Mr. Whitworth was telling me something about London when a man started shouting, then a gunshot and Colin fell to the floor. I was out of my chair like a shot, pulling my .45 Colt auto, and flicking off the safety at the same time. Amid the screaming and shouting, my eyes honed right in on a man pointing a gun at Colin who was lying on the floor. I couldn't shoot him as there were people right behind him, so I reversed grip on my pistol and brought the butt right across the side of his head as hard as I could. The man dropped like a sack of potatoes, whereby I drove my boot straight into his face as hard as I could, dropping to Colin's side, I checked for vital signs.

The bullet had entered between his collarbone and breastbone…A lung shot, blood was now oozing at a dangerous flow from the wound. Ignoring the commotion around me, my first concern was getting him next door to the clinic. The next thing I knew Mark was next to me ripping Colin's shirt off and applying a bandage to the wound.

"Get him on his side!" Shouted Mark, "We've got to stop this bleeding!" Suddenly, we weren't in 1877 anymore but a little village in the Korengal Valley near the Kunar River, fighting for our lives. Mark is bending over one of the men who has taken a bullet in his side where his Kevlar vest doesn't cover.

Like so many times before, he is on "auto-pilot" performing his life-saving routine on another trooper. Somehow, a stretcher appears next to Colin as Mark and I carefully transfer him from the floor to the stretcher. I now see Montana and Sockie next to me, both wearing looks of extreme concern, now Melonie is here as well, as Mr. Whitworth and a man who comes in regularly man the stretcher. Amid the confusion I look and see the shooter still lying on the floor,

"Nobody touch that man!" I shout, as we move outside towards the clinic. Mark and Melonie are quickly scrubbing up and putting face masks on as Colin is transferred to the metal operating table. I remember him looking at me with a grim expression,

"Colin may not make it, sucking chest wound," I could see it in his eyes, slowly shaking my head, I just said,

"Save him Mark." Melonie asked that everybody not directly helping, leave right away, so I helped a crying Sockie out the door.

Back over at the saloon, there was a couple of guys helping the shooter try and get up, drawing my pistol, I snarled,

"You men get away from that piece of s**t; get the f**k out of here!" Seeing an angry determined man pointing a strange gun at them caused serious reconsideration with the shooter being left to drop back to the floor, and his buddies to exit the saloon immediately. I bent down to examine him, but suddenly an enraged Sockie appeared, kicking the man in his already bloody head. I pulled her away and managed to get her to calm down taking her to our table, where Klara and Montana did what they could to calm her. I returned to the bleeding man who was moaning in pain, and growled in his face,

"Mister, I don't know who you are, or why you shot my friend, but if he dies I'm going to tie you up out in the woods and let the bears and wolves chew on you." I managed to get him on his feet, shoving him through the door, and outside.

Pushing the now sobbing man over to a tree, I handcuffed him, with one cuff, the other I fastened around a branch forcing the man to stand with his right arm held up to a limb above him. One thing about 1877, you didn't have to worry about reading anyone their Miranda rights, or police brutality charges. As I headed back to the saloon, I heard him pleading with me to release him. I then spoke with Montana and Sockie assuring them that Colin stood a better chance of making it with Mark on the job than anyone else.

"Mark is an old hand at this," I told them, "While he's not a miracle worker, he comes mighty close, there's a lotta guys that owe their lives to him." Sockie told me that the guy that shot Colin was drunk, and making sour comments about Colin's banjo playing,

"Then he started shouting insults at Colin," she said, "Next thing I knew, he just shot Colin."

Then two men stepped forward, obviously friends of the guy,

'Pleas let our friend go," one of them pleaded, "He didn't mean it, he only wanted to frighten that mick into shutting up." This really pissed me off, and I just "launched."

"Listen you two dumb f***s, I don't care what the guys intentions were, I've got a good friend over in that clinic fighting for his life! You'd better damn well hope he pulls through or I'm gonna use your friend for target practice, the only thing left of your friend will be a shot up corpse, now get the f**k out of here, NOW!" Both threatened to tell sheriff Bullock, at which I shouted back,

"You just go ahead and do that little thing, see if I give a good goddamn!"

I then went over to the clinic where Mark and Melonie were working over Colin. I just stood back and didn't say anything; just watching them try and save Colin's life.

It was then I noticed Mark had set up a stand with a Plasma bag hanging from it, and an I V going into Colin's wrist.

"If you're just going to stand there, scrub up and get a gown on, I need someone to hold a light." In no time, I had washed up, and donned a gown and facemask, holding a large LED flashlight on Colin's chest wound. Watching Melonie, I saw a grim but determined woman learning what it takes to save a life. Mark was engaged in a running commentary describing not only what he was doing, but what was happening with Colin. I also noticed something else as well. When we were back in Iraq, and Afghanistan, Mark didn't like guys crowding too close or fussing around their buddy who he was working on. In this case, he was calmly guiding Melonie through the proper steps at stopping the bleeding, or cutting and repairing tissue.

Poor Colin looked like he was already dead, but I could just make out very shallow breathing. And so it went, I lost all track of time, as we worked on through the night. Finally around four thirty in the morning, Mark stood back and pronounced,

"It's up to God now people, Mel, take a bow, you were terrific, you too Brian, we've done everything we can for now, the important thing is to make sure the wound doesn't become infected."

"Where did you get that plasma?" I asked, Mark shrugged,

"Just some of the stuff I "liberated" before I came home, Colin was lucky, that was the only bag I was able to get, hopefully dad can scarf up a little more, but we're "cheating" here, as none of this stuff has been invented yet." It was then we noticed Sockie sleeping in one of the chairs up by the door, Melonie went up to wake her.

Sockie woke with a start, but seemed to breathe a small sigh of relief, when Melonie told her that Colin was alive, and would hopefully make it.

"I prayed for him so hard," she sobbed; together Mel and I escorted her out to her tent cabin, where Mel got her into bed. As she re-joined me, I asked her,

"So how you doing Mel, it looks like you've been through the wringer?"

She let out a long sigh,

"I've never been so wrought up in my life, even that time we saved Kitty's life, was never as intense as tonight. I-I, felt so much trepidation, but Mark kept re-assuring me that my skills were sound."

"Well, this is where it gets dicey," I said to her. "Here in 1877, infection is barely understood, a future president will die needlessly because his doctors not understanding infection kept poking around his wound with dirty fingers. What you can't see, CAN, kill you."

We returned to the clinic, where the smell of coffee boiling in the pot greeted our noses. As we sat around the table, drinking coffee, Mark began to open up,

"Thank god it wasn't a large caliber bullet, twenty-five or thirty-six, I think, didn't go real deep, but it did puncture his lung, we are just going to have to constantly monitor him, it's going to be very "touch and go," for the next week or so."

"How was the surgery?" I asked, "Did you feel the shortage of modern equipment really hindered the operation?" Mark smiled,

"What do you think? Naturally, modern anesthesia, and blood transfusion technology would have been great, but this is real-life 1877, and we have to work with what we have, don't we Mel?"

Melonie finished her sip of coffee, and frowned,

"I feel so inadequate at times like these, and envious at the same time for all that you have in your time, but that's just the reality isn't it? I am so grateful to Mark for trying to help me learn the little things I can do to increase my patients chances to recover and live."

I had Craig throw together a tiny one cell "box" where we threw one Walter Jenks the asshole who shot Colin. Mark insisted on doing what he could for the guy, which amounted to little more than bandaging his facial contusions, and broken teeth, and giving him a couple aspirins. We set up a round-the-clock vigil which included Mark and Melonie, Craig and I, along with Sockie, who I caught on a number of occasions, praying at Colin's bedside. Once, as she was leaving, I asked her,

"I take it; you've gotten quite fond of Colin?" Glaring at me, she responded,

"It is none of your business Mr. Yankton, so what if I am?"

"Calm down Sockie," I calmly replied, "We're all concerned about Colin; after all, he is my friend as well. Look Sockie, I'm glad to see you're going to give love another chance, I for one wish you two all the best, Colin is a damn good man, one I think you could really settle down with."

She gave me a curious look, but said nothing,

"You know," I added, "if you two have wedding bells on your minds, perhaps we can set you two up in a room in the new boarding house we're getting ready to build." Between worrying about Colin, and trying to take care of the two kids, we had our hands full. Klara stepped in and took charge of the children, finding things for them to do, and keep busy, when she wasn't tending bar, or sitting by Colin's bed, Sockie would make attempts to talk with the kids. Slowly but surely, they started to open up, first Steinar, then Inge. Mark gave Sockie pointers on what to say, and what not to. Klara also reported that the children were waking up at night screaming from bad dreams, she told me the plight of those two little ones tore her heart out, but there wasn't a whole lot we could really do, at least they were getting more help here than most places.

A couple days after Colin was shot, Mark pronounced him "out of the woods." Sockie and I were there to greet him as he slowly woke. With our masks on and dressed in hospital surgical gowns, He was still very weak, but his color was starting to come back.

"Hey Colin," I said, "Word is you're going make it, you've got a lot of people pulling for ya!" He started to speak, but Melonie hushed him asking that he remain quiet. Sockie then bent down and kissed his forehead through her mask.

"I'm praying for you dear Colin," she quietly said. "I was so frightened you had died, but Melonie and Mr. Sedgwick saved you life." As weak as he was, Colin managed to give her a smile,

"Well they don't want us to disturb you too much guy, so we'll let you get some sleep, catch you later." A little over a week later, Colin was starting to sit up, and was now talking.

"I didna even see the fella who shot me," explained Colin, "I was finishing up me song, and the next thing I knows is something punches me right below me shoulder, knocking me to the floor." I explained to him exactly what had happened, and that Craig and I had taken the guy down to Deadwood the other day and turned him over to the sheriff for trial.

"Bullock was surprised as hell I hadn't killed him," I told Colin, "But he promised me there would be a trial." I also detailed the boarding house that was soon to come, and that there was going to be a room just for Sockie and he.