CHAPTER 3
Correspondence Across the Territory
Josiah read Caleb Ashworth's letter aloud to Ruth over their evening tea, and found himself, by the letter's conclusion, glancing up to find his sister listening with rather more focused attention than she generally extended to the ministry's ordinary correspondence.
“He sounds a troubled man,” Ruth observed, when Josiah had finished.
“Though I'll own the trouble seems rooted in genuine grief rather than any character failing.
A physician who blames himself for a patient's death, even one he loved dearly, strikes me as a man who takes his considerable responsibilities seriously, which speaks rather well of his fitness for the position, whatever emotional burden currently attends it.”
“That's precisely my own assessment, though I confess I'm somewhat wary of bringing a man in such evident distress into a position where the whole territory's health depends on his steady judgment. What if his grief compromises his medical competence, same as he fears it already has?”
“I'd wager,” Ruth said thoughtfully, “that a man honest enough to voice that particular fear aloud, in a letter to a stranger no less, is considerably less likely to actually suffer the compromised judgment he's worried about than a man too proud to admit the fear existed at all. Denial strikes me as a good deal more dangerous than acknowledged uncertainty, in a physician or anyone else.”
Josiah considered his sister's counsel with the same careful weight he generally extended her judgment on matters of the heart, having watched her matchmaking instincts prove sound eleven times running now, and found himself, turning the matter over, inclined to trust her assessment on this rather different but not entirely unrelated question of character.
“I'll write him back directly,” he decided, “and extend the position, provided he's willing to undertake the journey and the town proves willing to extend him the same patient welcome it's extended our various brides these past years.”
“I'd wager the town will welcome a physician readily enough, whatever his personal burdens, given how urgently we're presently wanting proper medical care. I'll make certain to extend whatever welcome I can personally offer, same as I've done for every other newcomer these past years.”
This assurance, offered with the same reflexive generosity Ruth extended to every one of the town's newcomers, carried within it no particular premonition of how thoroughly this specific welcome would eventually reshape her own carefully ordered life, and she thought little more of the matter beyond its practical implications for the town's medical needs as she went about the following weeks' ordinary ministry business.
Caleb's reply arrived within the fortnight, accepting the position with an evident relief that suggested the decision had cost him rather less deliberation than his own uncertain letter might have predicted, and included, alongside the practical particulars of his intended travel arrangements, a brief further note that struck Ruth, reading it over Josiah's shoulder, as rather more revealing than its author had likely intended.
I confess, Caleb had written, that I approach this considerable relocation with a mixture of genuine hope and persistent doubt regarding my own continued fitness for medical practice.
I do not ask your community to make special allowance for whatever uncertainty I carry with me, only that you understand, should my early performance prove less confident than a physician's typically ought to be, that the uncertainty stems from genuine grief rather than any fundamental incompetence, and that I intend to work diligently toward reclaiming whatever confidence Eleanor's death has temporarily diminished.
“He's rather hard on himself,” Ruth observed, reading this passage a second time.
“I'd wager this particular physician needs rather more than merely a fresh professional start.
He needs someone to help him properly forgive himself for a death that, by his own father-in-law's assessment, no physician alive could have prevented.”
“That sounds rather like a project suited to your particular talents, Ruthie,” Josiah observed, with a small, knowing smile that Ruth chose, at the time, not to properly examine.
“I've no particular talent for treating a grieving physician's guilt, Josiah, beyond the ordinary Christian charity I'd extend to any newcomer facing genuine hardship. Don't go reading more into my interest than plain neighborly concern warrants.”
Josiah said nothing further on the matter, though his knowing smile lingered rather longer than Ruth's firm denial strictly accounted for, and he found himself, in the weeks preceding Dr. Ashworth's expected arrival, watching his sister with the particular quiet anticipation of a man who suspected, correctly as it would eventually prove, that this particular correspondence carried rather more significance for both parties than either had yet properly acknowledged.
Ruth spent the intervening weeks preparing the town for its new physician's arrival with the same thorough attention she generally brought to welcoming a new bride, arranging for the modest house adjacent to Doc Hansen's old office to be properly aired and cleaned, coordinating with several of the district's families to ensure a reasonable supply of provisions awaited him upon arrival, and generally applying her considerable four years of practiced hospitality to a newcomer whose profession, if not his personal circumstances, differed rather markedly from the brides she had previously welcomed.
“You're taking rather particular care with these arrangements,” Bess Beal observed, helping Ruth air the small house's long-closed rooms one warm September afternoon. “I don't recall you fussing quite this thoroughly over the mercantile clerk's arrival last spring.”
“A physician's welcome wants rather more care than a clerk's, Bess, given how considerably this whole district depends on his eventual competence and comfort both. I'd simply see him settled properly, that he might attend to his medical duties without unnecessary domestic distraction.”
“If you say so, dear. Though I'll note you've asked after his particular circumstances rather more than you generally trouble yourself with a newcomer's personal history.”
Ruth found herself without any particularly convincing response to this gentle observation, and busied herself instead with the practical business of properly airing the house's musty parlor, understanding, with some private discomfort, that her own considerable curiosity regarding Dr. Ashworth's circumstances had indeed exceeded her usual professional interest in a newcomer's practical welfare, though she was not yet prepared to properly examine what that excess curiosity might actually signify.
Bess, watching her friend's evident discomfort with poorly concealed amusement, pressed the matter no further that particular afternoon, though she found occasion to mention the exchange to her own husband Cyrus that evening, the two of them agreeing, over their own supper, that Ruth's unusual attentiveness regarding this particular newcomer bore watching with considerable interest.
“I'd wager,” Cyrus observed, with the confidence of a man who had watched a fair number of Goldpine's courtships unfold from his own privileged vantage at the mine, “that our Ruth's about to discover the very same lesson she's helped teach eleven other folks these past years.
Nobody's ever quite so immune to romance as they believe themselves to be, provided the right particular person eventually comes along.”
“I'd not go placing wagers on it just yet, Cyrus, the poor man hasn't even properly arrived. Though I'll own I noticed the same particular attentiveness you did, and I'd not be entirely surprised if this whole thing developed exactly as you're predicting.”
This quiet speculation, shared between two of the town's most perceptive observers, proved considerably more prescient than either could have properly known at the time, though its accuracy would not become fully evident for some months yet, as Ruth herself continued determinedly unaware of the considerable shift already beginning to unfold in her own carefully guarded heart.
Ruth spent the final days before Caleb's expected arrival attending to a hundred small practical details, from ensuring the office's medicine cabinet was properly restocked to arranging for a local widow to provide the new physician's laundry service, each task approached with the same thorough professionalism she brought to welcoming any newcomer, though she found herself, checking and rechecking these arrangements rather more times than strict necessity required, wondering privately whether her own unusual thoroughness signaled something she wasn't yet prepared to properly examine.
“You've inspected that pantry three times already this morning,” Josiah observed, finding her once more counting the shelved provisions with a concentration that suggested she expected the count to have somehow changed since her previous inspection.
“I'd wager Dr. Ashworth will find the accommodations perfectly adequate, Ruthie, without quite this degree of repeated verification.”
“I simply want everything properly arranged before his arrival, Josiah. There's nothing remarkable in wanting a newcomer to feel genuinely welcomed.”
“There's nothing remarkable in the wanting, sister, only in the rather unusual thoroughness of the execution. But I'll not press the observation further, only note it for whatever future reference it might prove useful.”
This gentle teasing, offered with evident brotherly affection rather than any genuine criticism, settled into Ruth's ongoing awareness that her own behavior regarding this particular newcomer's arrival had already begun attracting notice, whatever careful composure she continued to maintain regarding her own uncertain feelings.
She spent that final evening before Caleb's expected arrival reviewing, one final time, the whole considerable correspondence that had brought this new physician to Goldpine, rereading his own candid letter about Eleanor's death and his uncertain fitness for continued practice, and found herself feeling a genuine, unexpected tenderness toward this stranger whose grief she had not yet properly witnessed but already, somehow, felt considerable sympathy for.
She wondered, folding the letter carefully back into its envelope, what particular kind of man might emerge from beneath such evident sorrow, once given proper time and this territory's particular gift for healing to work their gradual, patient magic upon him.
She prayed, that final evening, in the simple, direct manner she generally reserved for matters of genuine consequence, asking not for any particular outcome regarding this new physician's arrival but simply for wisdom to properly welcome him, patience to extend whatever healing this territory might offer him, and discernment to recognize what this whole considerable undertaking might ultimately require of her own heart, whatever shape that requirement eventually took.
She woke early the following morning, well before the coach's expected arrival, and spent the intervening hours in the particular restless activity of a woman managing considerable anticipation through practical busyness — rechecking the small physician's house one final time, arranging a small vase of late summer flowers on the kitchen table as a gesture of welcome, reviewing her own appearance in the small hall mirror with more attention than the occasion strictly required.
Josiah, observing this flurry of preparation over their hurried breakfast, offered no further comment beyond his earlier gentle teasing, understanding that his sister's own particular reckoning would unfold in its own proper time, whatever form that reckoning eventually took.
The whole town seemed, that particular morning, to share something of Ruth's own quiet anticipation, several families having already expressed their eagerness for the district's medical needs to finally find proper resolution after three long months of relying on distant Cheyenne for anything beyond basic first aid.
Mrs. Petty stopped by the mercantile counter especially early that day, ostensibly to purchase thread but evidently rather more interested in confirming the exact hour of the new physician's expected arrival, and Ruth found herself, fielding these various eager inquiries, feeling the whole weight of the town's collective hope resting rather more heavily on her own shoulders than she had properly anticipated when she'd first suggested revising Josiah's notice toward evoking genuine fresh starts.