He Calls Her Doc by Mary Brady

Author:Mary Brady
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2009-05-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

MAUDE REALIZED she was gaping at the council members and alternately at Guy Daley in horror. Guy, at least, had the civility to toss an apologetic glance in her direction.

An apology for taking away her livelihood, her self-respect—She closed her mouth and turned away. Everything she had wanted since she was ten years old.

“Maude,” Guy called after her.

Apology not accepted. She tossed the cup of ice cream in the trash can and did not turn back.

“Uncle Guy. Uncle Guy,” Lexie hollered as Maude headed for the edge of the square. “You have to come over here, Uncle Guy.”

To hell with Chicago, Maude thought. They were going to have to drag her kicking and screaming from this valley.

The town council members had been exercising their right to ask a new doctor to work in the valley. She didn’t own the people after all. All she really had the right to was the clinic building and what went on inside.

She didn’t have an innate right to the patients’ hearts or any part of them. It should be that way. Whoever practiced medicine here had the responsibility to earn the respect of these people. In this valley that someone was going to be her.

As she walked, the afternoon breeze cooled her ire and her bravado began to fade. She hadn’t thought she would have to win the valley by conquest, but it was war or the highway. She’d have to sharpen her spear.

She smiled as she trudged up her driveway, wondering if the town council sorely regretted that they were forced by Doc Avery’s schedule to have his party and the annual picnic separately. They were going to have to buy ice cream twice, three times if they welcomed Dr. Daley with an ice-cream social.

She yanked open her back door and plopped down at the kitchen table. After staring for a while at the scrawny mountain birch that seemed to stand defiantly against the backdrop of the towering forest in her backyard, she pushed up and went to the window. “I’m going to watch you grow up,” she said to the little tree and it answered her by happily dancing in the breeze.

Footsteps tread on her back porch. Must be her parents. They were good-hearted people. Maude knew she should appreciate her mother’s efforts, and she was sure she would when things were all finished.

“Hello, Maudie dear,” her mother greeted as she entered the back door followed by her husband heavily burdened with luggage and sample books.

“I was just about to make coffee. Do you want some?” She welcomed each to her home with a hug.

“No, thank you, dear. I’m going to get these samples ready for you to look at.”

Her father kissed her on the head and gave her a sympathetic look. Then he followed his wife into the living room, carrying enough samples to make a patchwork quilt big enough to cover the entire house.

As Maude poured beans into the coffee grinder, an image popped into her head. One male doctor and two town councilmen hanged by their thumbs on the street corners of St.

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