Earth Angels (7 page)

His expression was somber when at last he came into the kitchen, where everyone waited expectantly. “Elmer has pneumonia,” Joseph explained. “He needs to be massaged to drain the lungs, with alcohol rubs to reduce the fever. I’ll bring eucalyptus oil for him to inhale to ease his breathing, along with other medication.”

“But he’s gonna be alright, isn’t he, Doc?” Lars, one of Elmer’s grandsons, looked worriedly at Joseph. “He’s gonna get through this, isn’t he?”

Joseph didn’t reply directly. “We’ll make him as comfortable as possible,” he said. “I’ll be back in an hour with the medications.”

When they were in the buggy, hurrying the horses towards town, Emma said, “You didn’t promise that Elmer was going to get better. Is he going to die?”

“Yes,” Joseph said quietly, urging the horse to a gallop. “It’s Elmer’s time. All I can do is make his passing as gentle as I can.”

“How do you know for sure? Don’t people sometimes rally even when they’re very ill?”

“They do, but that won’t happen in this case.”

“I heard you asking questions, I thought for a moment there was someone in that room besides you and Elmer.”

Joseph turned and looked at her, and then quickly looked away. “Sometimes I pray out loud.”

Emma didn’t pursue it, but what she’d heard didn’t sound at all like praying. It sounded like a one sided conversation. But who on earth was Joseph talking to?

Elmer died two days later. Joseph had stayed with him until the end. And he’d been right about his prediction that Elmer wouldn’t survive.

After that, Emma watched and listened closely when she was along on Joseph’s calls, fascinated by the change that came over him when he was with someone who was ill. Gone was the endearing clumsiness, the shyness that touched her. With his patients he was confident, gentle, wise and reassuring. He paid close attention to their complaints and at times seemed to be listening even after they finished speaking, nodding his head and murmuring in that peculiar, distracted fashion, asking questions as if someone was there to answer them.

Emma finally decided it was simply a part of Joseph’s extraordinary healing ability. At times he acted peculiar and eccentric, but then, Joseph wasn’t at all like the other men she knew, which was exactly why she found him so intriguing.

In spite of his differences, though, almost everyone liked and respected Joseph, but Emma noticed that it was the older folk in the community who absolutely adored him. He was unfailingly patient with them, listening to their long-winded stories and even enjoying them. In many cases, his elderly patients were painfully poor, living on the often-grudging charity of relatives or eking out a bare existence in dismal, cold cottages.

Emma noticed that wherever and whenever he could, Joseph quietly supplied food, clothing and firewood, always in a way that allowed the recipients to retain their pride.

She was with him when he delivered the sheets to old Mrs. Simpson, asking her if she would be kind enough to mend some shirts for him in exchange for the sheets, making it sound as if she would be doing him an immense favor. Emma marveled at his tact.

She also soon took great delight in helping him. From the store, she packed up food that was a little past its peak, clothing that hadn’t sold but was serviceable, and lengths of fabric that were flawed in some small fashion. She quietly left them wherever they were most needed.

They were heading home in Joseph’s open buggy one warm, cloudy evening in late March. They’d been to visit a very sick old man and taken him a basket crammed with food. Suddenly it began to rain, only a few drops at first, and then a downpour. Joseph urged the horse to a trot and then to a gallop, but by the time they arrived at Emma’s store a half-hour later, they were drenched to the skin and laughing uproariously.

They raced through the deluge up the steps to her apartment and burst through the door. Emma lit a lamp and giggled even harder when she looked at Joseph. “Oh my goodness, you look like a drowned rat.”

His hair was flat, splayed across his forehead and neck in dripping strands. Drops of water trickled down his chin. His rain-spattered spectacles were perched on the tip of his nose. He’d taken his suit jacket off and draped it around her shoulders to protect her, and his white cotton shirt clung to him. Water oozed from his shoes and pooled on the scatter rug.

“A drowned rat, hmmmmm?” He reached out a lightning quick hand and tugged her into his arms. “Well, this drowned rat can’t see you unless you’re very close.” He held her tight, studying her with frowning intensity. “My, my, you look rather drowned yourself, Miss Walsh,” he growled. “Your hair is loose down your back, and it’s soaked—“ he took a thick handful of the curling strands, gently using it to tip her head back. His teasing, half rough kiss predictably set her on fire.

And him as well. “Emma…….Oh my God, Emma, you are so beautiful.”

He tore his glasses off, dropping them heedlessly on the nearby table and then slanted his head so his mouth fit hers at a more intimate angle. Their tongues danced, and need flared within her. Moving even closer to him, she twisted her arms around his neck, shivering.

With a strangled groan, he shoved the wet coat from her shoulders and cupped her swelling breasts. Pressed against him, her soaked skirts and petticoats clinging to her legs, she could feel him grow hard. With innocent hunger, she rubbed against him.

“Emma, my dearest Emma, we must stop.” His breath was hot in her ear, his tone urgent, but even as he spoke, his hands were stroking her breasts, his body even closer to hers. “You’re innocent, I mustn’t—“

Her voice was thick with need. “I’m a grown woman, Joseph. I care for you, I want you.” Every inch of her body felt flushed.

He grew still.

“Please,” she mouthed against his ear, and exultation swept over her as she sensed his defenses crumble.

Turning her around, he undid the buttons at the back of her dress, her petticoat ties, the small pearl fastenings of her soaked chemise. As she breathed a long sigh, he stripped off her pantaloons, garters and stockings in one efficient movement.

Then his own wet clothing lay beside hers on the rug. In the flickering lamplight, her breath caught as she stared at the strong, clear-cut beauty of his body. Tall and muscular, he was everything she’d ever fantasized her lover might be.

“Oh, Joseph.” She slid hesitant fingers through the silky hair on his chest. He was holding her close, skin to skin, and she could hardly breathe for the urgent sensations in her body.

“I love you, Emma.”

His quiet, earnest words wrapped around her heart and soul.

He slid his hand under her thighs and swept her into his arms. Without his glasses he misjudged the doorway and she banged her head a little, but she hardly felt it.

He put her down on the soft feather bed in her dark bedroom. She felt him lie down at her side, his weight on one elbow, his free hand gliding down her body as if he were memorizing, by touch alone, the shape and feel of her.

She rested her hand on his chest and felt his wildly beating heart. Her own was pounding so hard she trembled. Everywhere his fingers stroked, her skin seemed to catch fire.

“You are ravishing, Emma.” His voice was rough, raw-edged, filled with desire, and it thrilled her. “So very, very, lovely……”

She could feel his rapid breathing in her skin, and then at last he kissed her, long, passionately, while his hands roamed ceaselessly across her breasts. He teased her aching nipples, then his hand moved with maddening slowness down her abdomen, gently easing her thighs apart, sliding his fingers inside her.

She could feel his manhood, hot, throbbing, urgent, pressed against her thigh, and for a moment she stiffened, shy and frightened. She wasn’t certain exactly what came next.

“You’re quite certain you want to do this, my darling?”

She nodded, her hair imprisoned beneath his shoulder. The query was gentle, allowing her to reconfirm all she felt and wanted—or, if she desired, to change her mind.

“I’m certain, Joseph.”

He took her nipple in his mouth, his tongue and teeth making her cry out with pleasure and frustration. His fingers stroked her, causing her to move involuntarily, thrusting up against the delicious pressure of his hand. Desperate need built in her, seeking a fulfillment she hadn’t known existed.

Then she arched and screamed his name, and groaning, he straddled her. With one long, sure movement they were joined. The shock of his entry coming on the crest of such pleasure made her tense and cry out again, but the fierce pain lasted only a moment.

Then her body opened, hungry for him. The ecstasy returned, and she learned his capacity for gentleness as well as the ferocity of his strength.

When at last she lay, sated and limp, marveling at the power of this exquisite dance and how wonderfully talented he was at it, she realized that she could echo his own words back to him. “I love you too, Joseph.” Then she sighed, utterly content, as happy as she’d ever been in her entire life.

Joseph smiled as he began to prepare his breakfast. He was eating much more frequently now and taking better care of himself. And he had wonderful, irresistible Emma to thank for that.

He’d made love to other women, of course, before Emma. He was a young, virile man, and opportunities as an intern were always there. He’d just never made love to the same woman repeatedly. For him, lovemaking had been a matter of physical release, and it held no similarity at all to what he shared with Emma.

She was like an opiate. The more time he spent with her, the more he longed to spend. In the enchanted days that had followed their first magical time together, all Joseph could thing of was the curve of her back, her delicate throat. He listened to patient’s symptoms and thought of Emma. Intoxicated with her, he couldn’t stop smiling at inappropriate moments. He whistled cheerfully as he lanced boils and stitched gaping wounds. He’d never noticed before how green the new spring leaves were, how sweetly the birds sang as they built nests.

To his dismay, however, he also noticed how many men still seemed to hang around Emma’s store. The stove was unlit now that warmer weather was here, but in his opinion, the high backed chairs were all too often occupied by young men who ought to have better things to do than loiter idly.

Surely there were fields to clear, crops to plant, stock to tend to? He’d said as much to Emma, his voice testy, and she’d just shrugged, holding her hands out in a helpless gesture, smiling at him with studied innocence. “The store’s a public place, Joseph. I’m certainly not their mother, to tell them what they ought to be doing.”

Then don’t act their sweetheart either,
he had wanted to snap at her. But of course he hadn’t.

Thinking of that conversation now, his irritation rose all over again as he turned the bacon and got the eggs out of the icebox.

He’d started dropping by the store whenever his surgery emptied to see Emma and exchange a few words. At least, he told himself that was his only reason for hurrying over every chance he got.

But at four separate times in the space of one week, Oscar Macky had been there, lounging at the counter or sprawled in a chair at the back, watching Emma’s every move with his hot, dark eyes. He teased her and made idiotic, stupid jokes.

What incensed Joseph was that Emma giggled at Oscar’s foolishness, tossing her head and teasing him back.

George Rankin, the new young schoolteacher—also a single man—had also been in the store most afternoons. Joseph had ignored the shy young man until one day he found him reading to Emma from a book of poetry. Some ridiculous jingle had her laughing until tears came and she dabbed at her eyes an absurd scrap of pink lace. When the reading was over, she had put her arm on George’s arm in an affectionate gesture that Joseph thought was entirely inappropriate.

“Thank you so much for sharing that with me, George,” she’d said, smiling up at him. “I do so love nonsense rhymes.”

Joseph cracked the eggs against the side of the skillet with more force than necessary and the yolks broke. He’d wanted to shake Emma that day. Didn’t she recognize the naked adoration on George Rankin’s narrow face? It was entirely wrong of her to encourage the poor man.

He had wrestled with the alarming emotions these encounters roused in him, trying to subdue the anger he felt at her flirtatious ways. But each day seemed to bring some new evidence that Emma was irresponsible with her affections.

Why, just yesterday he had watched, filled with outrage, as she allowed a pathetic widower who was fifty at least to present her with a bouquet of wildflowers. She had smiled at the man with the same wide, affectionate smile she’d given Joseph just moments before.

Then there was the memory of the afternoon he’d been getting his hair cut. Remembering that almost made him spill the eggs on the floor instead of onto the plate.

From his seat in the barber’s chair he’d seen Emma walking down the street with a tall young stranger, talking with animation to him and tilting her head back, laughing up at him. The gentleman—if he was a gentleman—had appeared mesmerized by her, and Joseph had watched the four old men in front of the barbershop exchange knowing glances as she passed by on the stranger’s arm.

His insides had knotted, but he’d never mentioned to her that he’d seen her. Instead, he waited for her to tell him. But she hadn’t, and when he’d finally asked her about it, she’d answered offhandedly that the man was a travelling salesman for a dry goods company she dealt with.