The Doctor Takes a Wife

“You’re very welcome.” He placed the cake inside his rolltop desk and closed the cover over it. No sense giving anyone anything else to gossip about.

She opened the door, and Nolan saw that one of the young married women of the town stood in the waiting room, holding a red-faced, squirming toddler, while another child not much older clung to her skirts.

“Howdy, Sarah.”

“Lulabelle, looks like you’ve got your hands full,” Sarah observed.

The young mother gave her a flustered smile before turning to Nolan. “Doctor, Lee here stuck a black-eyed pea in his ear and I can’t get it out nohow,” the exasperated mother told him.

“Well, bring him in, I’m sure we can remove it,” he said, but his eyes lingered on Sarah’s graceful figure as she exited.

Because I know what it’s like to be feel friendless.

His answer reverberated in her mind as she stepped into the street. There were so very many things she wanted to know about him. Why would Nolan Walker ever have been friendless? He’d made friends effortlessly soon after arriving in town, and just look how easily he’d managed to talk her into being friends, if they could not be more than that. Had he meant the loneliness he’d felt when his wife and son had died?

She would have asked him if Lulabelle Harding hadn’t brought her child in just then, and she still wanted to know. Perhaps she could ask him about it some other time. And he had never told her what he’d been doing in Brazos County during the time he had been corresponding with her—had he been assigned with federal occupying troops? He must have been. What other reason could he have had for being there?

Sarah had been surprised by Nolan’s request that she try to be a friend to Ada. Thinking she should go talk to her now while the resolve was fresh in her mind, she started to turn down the road that led past the doctor’s house to the home Ada shared with her parents, then hesitated. If she went there now, Ada would realize she had come straight from the doctor’s office and guess that Nolan had put her up to it. She might even jump to the wrong conclusion that the doctor had violated her confidence. And Ada’s parents would be there, which meant that she and Ada might not have any privacy to talk.

No, it was best that she encounter Ada casually in town, if possible. Perhaps she could talk to Milly about it? Milly always seemed to know everything about everyone around Simpson Creek, though she did not gossip. But if Sarah were to tell her that she had reason to be concerned about Ada, Milly might have some insight about what could be troubling the woman. Perhaps she would think it was a simple matter of grief over Ada’s slain beau and what to Ada had been a promising courtship cut tragically short. Milly and Sarah, however, had learned the truth about the man’s character from Nick, who had known Harvey in India.

Sarah thought about riding out to the ranch. She’d love to see her sister, and inquire how she was doing now that the cooking chores were all up to her. Prissy’s father had made it clear that Sarah was free to borrow a riding horse from the stable any time she desired.

She cast an eye at the sky. Gray clouds still hung over the western horizon, threatening rain, and by now it had to be nearly noon. By the time she walked back to the cottage, changed into her riding skirt, had Antonio, the Gilmores’ servant, saddle a horse for her and rode out to the ranch, it would be midafternoon. And she still needed to stop into the mercantile and hotel restaurant and promise their respective proprietors that she would be baking again starting tomorrow, and Prissy had asked her to look at lighter curtain material for their main room… No, she would not go today.

But she could always pray about the matter, she realized, feeling guilty that she hadn’t thought of that first. No matter when she spoke to Ada, it was best to do so after seeking heavenly guidance, not before. She needed to stop using prayer as a last resort, after she had exhausted all her own efforts, and think of it first.

Father, I’m concerned about Ada Spencer. I don’t know what’s troubling her, but You do, Lord. Please help her to realize You are always with her, wanting to aid her. Help her to look to You for her needs. And please show me how to be a true friend to her…