“How is Mr. Flowers?” Sally asked, her voice weak.
Cal looked toward Flowers and saw that he was dead. But before he could respond to Sally, she passed out.
“We need a doctor!” Cal said. “Is there a doctor in this town?”
“Yes,” Tamara said. “His office is down the street, just over the hardware store!”
Cal didn’t have to go all the way down to the doctor’s office. The doctor was across the street looking at the man who had fired the shotgun.
“How’s the sheriff ?” one of those gathered around the doctor said.
“He’s dead.” The doctor looked at the man on the ground and shook his head. “Poor Mr. Deckert is too.”
“What about the outlaw?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t checked on him yet.”
“Doctor, quick!” Cal called. “There’s a woman in the bank who’s been shot and is still alive!”
“A woman was shot?” one of the people in the crowd said. “You mean those no count sons of bitches shot a woman?”
“The outlaw can wait. Where is the woman?” the doctor asked, carrying his bag and starting toward Cal.
“She’s in the bank, on the floor. The owner of the bank, he’s there too, but he’s dead.”
“That’s three,” someone said. “Three, they kilt. And like as not, the woman is goin’ to die too.”
“No!” Cal shouted angrily. “Miss Sally is not going to die! Do you hear me? She is not going to die!”
When Cal and the doctor stepped into the bank, Tamara was on her knees beside Sally. Tamara had taken off her petticoat and was holding it in a wad over the wound. The petticoat was already soaked with blood.
“Very good, Mrs. McKenzie,” the doctor said. “You are doing exactly the right thing by stopping the bleeding like that. Let me look at the wound.”
The doctor removed the blood soaked petticoat and looked at the wound. The blood coming from the bullet hole was very dark in color, and it was coming out in a slow, but steady flow. “Good. The bleeding is venous instead of arterial.”
He put his hand under Sally’s back, felt around, then frowned. “The bullet is still inside. It’s going to have to come out.”
“Is she going to live, Doc?” Cal asked anxiously.
“I don’t know. We need to get her to my office.”
Several people had come into the bank.
“How is she, Dr. Gunther?” one of the townspeople asked.
“She’s in bad shape,” Dr. Gunther said. “Paul, run across the street, get a blanket from the mercantile. Tell C.D. I’ll pay for it later. We need it to carry her to my office.”
Within a few minutes Paul returned with a blanket. Dr. Gunther put a man at each corner, one of them being Cal, then instructed them to pick her up. A cavalcade of bystanders followed them to the doctor’s office, which could only be reached by going up a set of stairs along the side of the hardware store building.
Dr. Gunther turned toward them.
“All of you stay down here. The only people allowed up are the four who are carrying her, then they are going to have to leave as well.”
“I’m not leavin’ her, Dr. Gunther,” Cal said resolutely.
“All right, you can stay.”
“I intend to stay as well,” Tamara said.
“Yes, I want you to stay. I will need you. You can act as my nurse. But no one else.”
The four men, holding the blanket in such a way as to keep Sally as level as possible, climbed the stairs until they reached the top. Maneuvering her through the door, they took Sally’s still unconscious form into the office, and laid her on the examination table.
Dr. Gunther took two clean sheets and a pair of scissors from a cabinet. “Mrs. McKenzie. I want you to strip her naked. You will probably have to cut her clothes off. Then place these two sheets over her, one across the top of her body and one across the bottom. But leave the wound exposed so I can examine it.”
“You’re going to take all her clothes off ?” Cal asked in alarm.
“I have to. But these bed sheets will preserve her modesty.”
“I ain’t goin’ to watch this,” Cal said.
Dr. Gunther chuckled. “I don’t intend for you to. You and I will wait over there until it is done. Mrs. McKenzie, please do it as quickly as you can.”
“What am I going to tell Smoke?” Cal asked as he paced back and forth.
“Smoke?”
“Smoke Jensen. He’s Sally’s husband.”
“Oh, Lord,” Dr. Gunther said. “I’ve never met Mr. Smoke Jensen, but I have certainly heard of him. And this is
