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Colton spent the rest of the morning in his office seeing to patients like the buckskin-wearing Odell Waters whose gout had flared up again; Manx Solomon who’d learned last week the dangers inherent in drinking while using an axe—he’d lopped off the first digit of his right thumb—and Russ Neville who’d taken to drink in a misguided attempt to kill the pain in the infected molar he refused to let Colt pull.
“Can’t you give me something?” Russ whined, holding his hand against his swollen whiskered jaw.
“Yes, a pair of pliers so you can pull it out yourself since you won’t let me or Carl Goldson do it.” Russ was an old mountain man friend of Ben, and equally as stubborn. Goldson was the town dentist.
“I ain’t letting either one of you pull it. It’s the last one I got back there.”
“The infection is only going to get worse and it can kill you if it gets in your blood.”
“You’re just trying to scare me.”
“Yes, I am. Let one of us pull the tooth, Russ.”
He stood up and wobbled a bit from all the drink. “No.” And he staggered out.
Colt watched him through the office window that faced the street and saw him head towards the saloon behind Miller’s store. He sighed and hoped he didn’t find the old man dead soon.
His next visitor was his boyhood friend, the sheriff. “Morning, Whit.”
“Morning. How’s your shoulder?”
“Stiff but healing.”
Whit took a seat in one of the two empty chairs by Colt’s desk. “You going to marry Miss Winchester?”
“She’s meeting Anna tonight. If that goes well, then yes.”
“Good for you.”
“And you say that, why?”
“We all need a woman to shake up our lives.”
“So, when are you going to find one to shake up yours?”
“I’m still looking over the herd. Haven’t found the right filly yet.”
“Colleen Enright is always available.”
“Not for all the coal in Wyoming. Poor Erasmus. The way she treated that man, I wouldn’t be surprised if she paid someone to push him down that chute. Besides, she’s got her lariat out for you, or at least she did before Miss Winchester shot her way onto the scene.”
“Even without Miss Winchester I had no intentions of giving Colleen my name or access to my bank account, small though it may be.”
Colt saw Minnie Gore outside the window heading his way. He hoped his office would somehow become invisible so she’d pass it by, but she pushed the door open and stepped inside. At her entrance, Whit stood and touched his hat in greeting. “Miss Minnie. Colt, I’ll stop back later.”
After Whit’s exit, Colt asked, “What can I do for you, Minnie.”
“You cannot marry that Carmichael woman. She’ll be a poor substitute for my Adele.”
Colt sighed inwardly. “Your advice is noted. Anything else?”
“Are you going to send her away?”
“If she gets along with Anna tonight at dinner, no, I won’t be sending her away.”
“Then I need to be there, too. I’ll not have her poisoning the well where Anna’s concerned.”
“You aren’t invited.”
