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about him that a thousand words could not tell. David Melcher, she could see, was a gentleman. Everything about him pleased her, and she later found herself inexplicably buoyant and humming while she worked in the kitchen preparing his meal. Perhaps she even felt the slightest bit wifely as she delivered the tray of bacon, eggs, and coffee, and wished she could stay and visit. But she had yet another patient needing her attention.
    At the bedroom doorway downstairs, she hesitated, gazing at the stranger on her bed. Just the fact that he was a criminal was disquieting, though he remained unconscious, unable to harm her in any way. His beard was coal black, as were his moustache and hair, but his skin, since last night, had taken on the color of tallow. Coming fully into the room, she studied him more closely. There was a sheen of sweat on his bare chest and arms, and she reached out tentatively to touch him, finding his body radiating an unhealthy inner heat.
    Quickly she fetched a bowl of vinegar water and sponged his face, neck, arms, and chest, as far as his waist, where the sheet stopped, then left the cool compresses on his brow in an effort to bring down his fever. She knew she must check his wound, but at the thought her palms went damp. She held her breath and gingerly lifted a corner of the sheet. Flames shot through her body at the sight of his nakedness. Her years of caring for an incontinent father had done nothing to prepare her for this! With a shaky hand she lay the sheet at an angle across his stomach, his genitals, and left leg, then fetched two firm bolsters to boost up his right knee. She snipped away the gauze bindings, but the bandages stuck to his skin, so next she mixed vinegar water with saltpeter and applied the dripping compresses to loosen the cotton from his wounds. The shot had hit him very high on the inner thigh, which had been firm before the bullet did its dirty work. But now, when the bangage fell free, she saw that the wound had begun bleeding again. One look and she knew she had her work cut out if he wasn't to bleed to death.
    Back in the kitchen she spooned alum into an iron frying pan, shaking it over the hot range until it smoked and darkened. She sprinkled the burnt alum liberally onto a fresh piece of gauze, but when she hurried back to the bedroom with the poultice, she stood horrified, gaping at the blood of this nameless train robber as it welled in the bullet hole then ran the short distance into the shallow valley of his groin, where coarse hair caught and held it.
    How long she stood staring at the raw wound and the collecting blood she did not know. But suddenly it was as if someone had shot her instead of him. Her body jerked as if from the recoil, and once again she was frantically bathing, staunching, praying. In the hours which followed, she fought against time as a mortal enemy. Realizing that he must soon eat… or die… she beat a piece of steak with a mallet and put it into salt water to steep into beef tea. But he kept bleeding and she began to doubt that he'd live to drink it. Remembering her Grandmother McKenzie saying they'd packed arrow wounds with dried ergot, she next made a poultice of the powdery rye fungus and applied it. Feeling the man's dark, wide brow, she realized it had not cooled, so she swabbed him with alcohol. But when she stopped sponging, he immediately grew hot again. The fever, she realized, must be fought from within rather than without. She scoured her mind and found yet another possibility.
    Wild gingerroot tea!
    But when she brought the ginger tea back to him, he lay as still as death, and the first spoonful dribbled from his lips, rolled past his ear, and stained the pillowcase a weak brown. She tried again to force another spoonful into his mouth, succeeding only in making him cough.
    "Drink it! Drink it!" she willed the unconscious man almost in an angry whisper. But it was no use; he'd choke if she forced the tea into his mouth this