Dr. Warner Phillips was the first physician to arrive at the Fremont Hotel after King Sutton was shot. A roly-poly man, Dr. Phillips bullied laymen though he was self-effacing with other doctors.
He had reason to be, for he had never attended medical college. Twenty years before, in Ashta-bula, Ohio, when wearied of farming, Warner Phillips began teaching himself the healing arts by reading medical texts, since he’d always had a gift of healing farm animals. Finally he moved to Pennsylvania, where he nailed a shingle to his door and used his busy practice to continue his education.
“Experience is the best teacher,” became his motto.
Dr. Phillips found King Sutton sprawled on the floor, bleeding profusely and unconscious. He away the clothing from the wound and saw that the bullet had entered Sutton’s chest just above the first rib.
The doctor felt for a pulse. There seemed to be none in Sutton’s left wrist, only a feeble one in his right. The patient’s hands and feet were cold. Dr. Phillips put his finger into the wound and explored it. The bullet had slanted upward to emerge under Sutton’s armpit.
Dr. Austin Dee arrived as Phillips completed his examination and immediately began his own. “There’s an artery severed,” he said when he was through.
“I beg to disagree, doctor,” Phillips said. “Look, the hemorrhaging has stopped. I doubt if the artery’s involved at all.”
“The artery may be clotted for the moment but the least movement will tear it open again.” Dee’s tone was positive.
Phillips began applying mustard plaster to Sutton’s hands and feet to try to restore his circulation. King moaned.
“Who’s responsible for the fee if he dies?” Dr. Dee asked.
“The Committee of Vigilance, I understand.”
“Good,” Dr. Dee said. “We’ll have to put in a sponge to plug that artery.”
Dr. Phillips hesitated. Probably Dee was right, he thought. Wasn’t the man a licentiate of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland? At least he claimed to be.
“I’m inclined to agree, doctor,” Phillips said. “At least putting in a sponge will give us time to put our heads together.”
Dr. Dee took a piece of white sponge the size of a large hen’s egg, moistened it with water, and shoved the sponge up into the wound. King Sutton moaned once and was quiet. Dee felt his pulse, then applied wet compresses and bandaged the wound.
“Now we’ll let nature take its course,” Dr. Dee said.
When a third physician, Dr. Chauncey Speer, arrived at the hotel an hour later he had to push his way through a throng milling outside waiting for news. In Sutton’s rooms, he found the two doctors arguing in a parlor clouded with tobacco smoke.
“There’s no question,” Dr. Dee was saying, “but that cholera’s caused by a morbid condition of the air. Miasma.”
“Not at all,” Dr. Phillips said. “My experience shows it comes from intemperance. I’ve seen three cases this past week and debauchery, drunkenness and bad food were involved in all three. Not to mention filth.”
After inquiring what had been done for the patient, Dr. Speer went into the bedroom where he found the unconscious Sutton lying on his massive bed. Dr. Speer examined him and rejoined his colleagues.
“We can’t wait any longer,” he told them. “This artery question has to be settled now. If the artery’s severed, we have to operate at once and suture it.”
“Closing the artery’s a risky business,” Dr. Dee said. “I thought at first the artery was involved but now I’m not sure. The hemorrhaging has stopped.”
“The risk must be taken. We can’t just wait. You said leave the sponge in. Now you say take it out and, I suppose, you want to suture the artery. Why can’t you make up your mind?”
“But doctor . . .” Phillips began.
“We can’t operate. Didn’t you see the extent of the swelling in the left breast? It must be congestion induced by the sponge.”
“Isn’t that a good reason to open him up? To let that fluid drain?”
“We’ve waited too long,” Dee said. “It’s too dangerous now. His condition’s become too precarious.”
“I think we should have another opinion.”
“Speer again?”
“Good God, not that pompous ass. What about that army surgeon, Griffen? I’m told he’s had experience with wounds in the Mexican War.”
“Most army surgeons,” Dr. Dee said, “aren’t worth the powder to blow them up with. As you know. Why would they stay in the army if they can make a living practicing on the outside?”
“Still we should have another opinion. Especially after the fuss Speer’s likely to make.” Dr. Phillips walked to the window and looked down at the crowd waiting for news. “The Committee of Vigilance is involved. They jailed that gambler Rhynne and they’ll put him on trial before the week’s out. Whatever happens, whether Sutton lives or dies, there’s bound to be an inquiry. The newspapers are into it, of course. I saw Curie in the corridor when I came here this morning.”
“I acknowledge the merit of your position, doctor. Yes, I totally agree that another opinion is indicated. And this Griffen is probably as good as anyone else. Dr. Griffen arrived at dusk. A stooped, arthritic man, he briskly examined the patient while mumbling to himself and dolefully shaking his head. When the three men came out of the bedroom, he glared at Phillips and Dee.
“Who put in that damned sponge?” he asked.
The two doctors looked at one another. “I did,” Dee admitted. “After consulting with Dr. Phillips.”
Griffen sighed.
“A temporary measure only, doctor,” Dee said. “We had to do something to stop the hemorrhaging, and we did succeed in doing that.”
“What do you recommend?” Dr. Phillips asked.
“It’s too late to operate,” Griffen said. “He’d die on the table. And it’s too late to remove the sponge. I suggest we relieve the-congestion with an incision under the armpit.”
“Anything else?”
“We might all try praying,”
When Dr. Griffen made the incision under the exit wound, great quantities of pus drained from the opening. King Sutton did not, however, rally. He remained stuporous. Dr. Phillips suggested they take turns at his bedside. Dr. Dee agreed but Dr. Griffen grunted and muttered something about a suspected case of cholera at the Presidio. He bid them goodnight and let himself out.”
“I’ll talk to the crowd out there,” Dee said. He went into the parlor. “Kingman Sutton is still alive but moribund,” he announced. “We’re doing all we can, but we hold out little hope, as the wound appears mortal. We’ve been fortunate to be able to prevent the patient’s suffering; we are struggling against odds to save him.” The message was passed from man to man along the corridor outside the room and was called from the window. “Dying, Sutton’s dying.” The word seemed to echo up from the street. “Dying, dying, dying.”
“I’m given to understand, doctor,” Curie said, “that there is considerable dispute among the attending physicians. Regarding the most appropriate treatment.”
“Not at all. You can ask Drs. Phillips and Griffen if you like. We all freely aired our opinions, of course, since medicine is still far from an exact science. But we were unanimous in the treatment decided upon. Unfortunately the patient is not responding. And that, gentlemen, is God’s will.”
Danny O’Lee watched the armed Vigilantes escort Wordsworth Rhynne along the waterfront street toward the jail.
“They caught him boarding the Sacramento packet disguised as a woman,” a man near Danny said. “He says he didn’t shoot Sutton. Can you believe that?”
After the capture, Danny knew, they had taken Rhynne to the Committee’s offices where the charge—attempted murder—was read to him. He was then marched through the city to the Argonaut, an old coastal freighter that had been converted into a jail.
Rhynne looked composed, almost nonchalant, as he walked up the ramp to the deck of the ship with his hands tied behind him. The Argonaut had been beached the month before and propped upright with four-by-four timbers. Eventually the land around and under the ship would be filled with dirt and rocks but now it perched high off the ground.
When Rhynne reached the top of the ramp he paused and looked to his right and left. Danny waved to him, trying to catch his eyes to give him some sign of encouragement. Rhynne, though, didn’t appear to see him before he was pushed into the ship’s cabin.
“They’ll try him as soon as Sutton gives up the ghost and hang him the day after,” someone said.
“If Sutton dies.”
“I heard he’s failing. They don’t expect him to live out the day.”
Only getting his just deserts, Danny thought. Had Rhynne shot him? Somehow Danny couldn’t believe he had. Why would Rhynne kill Sutton when he had so much to lose and nothing to gain? In the heat of passion perhaps? Danny couldn’t imagine Rhynne becoming so enraged he’d commit murder.
Danny crossed Portsmouth Street on his way to the Golden Empire. Although McSweeney and Abe Greene were running the gambling hall in Rhynne’s absence, Danny was worried. After all, most of his money was invested there.
Where had the rest of his money gone? To Selena, for the most part. She had had an endless passion for clothes and jewelry, or so it seemed to Danny. As fast as the Luck O’ the Irish Mine produced gold dust, Selena spent it. The lode and Selena’s passion for him had both run out at the same time.
Strange, though. He had no regrets. Selena had been worth all he had spent on her. Danny stopped short, staring at the two men walking ahead of him—both Vigilantes coming uptown from the Argonaut. One looked familiar, a big man with a neatly trimmed beard and a bit of a paunch. Who was he?
Danny increased his pace until he was only a few feet from the men as they paused on a street corner. One of them, not the man Danny thought he recognized, said, “The trial’s tomorrow at nine, Duke, if Sutton dies.”
Duke. Of course, Duke Olmsted. A leaner, better dressed Duke, but the same man who had killed Danny’s father three years before.
Duke said something to his companion and they parted with a handshake, Duke walking on up California Street. Danny followed, his hand touching the butt of the Colt thrust under his belt. Since the duel with Sutton he’d practiced long hours with the Colt and had developed into a fair shot.
Danny lagged behind, watching as Duke nodded to men passing on the street. He must have been right here in San Francisco all this time and Danny hadn’t been able to find him. Because he’d looked in all the wrong places. Duke no longer seemed a man who frequented waterfront hellholes.
I’ll wait until he’s alone, Danny told himself, and then I’ll kill him. With no more warning, no more chance to defend himself than he gave my dad. I’ll shoot him down and that will be the end of it.
A half mile from the docks, Duke Olmsted climbed the porch steps of a modest house and went inside. Danny found a barrel in an alley out of the house accompanied by a sallow-faced woman. She wore a grey dress and her hair was drawn into a bun at the back of her head. She looked up at Duke and he leaned over and kissed her lightly on the lips. When he set off for the city, the woman stood on the porch watching him until he was out of sight.
Danny pushed himself from the barrel and followed. They were almost to the Square when the city bell began to clang. The Vigilantes again? Danny wondered. Had Sutton died? No, the bell rang three times, was silent, then rang twice more. The signal was repeated, three and two, three and two.
Fire!
With the first ringing of the bell, Duke started to run. He turned up a side street with Danny a hundred feet behind. Danny saw smoke billow into the sky ahead of them. Men were running beside him, then he heard the crackle of flames. He turned a corner and saw a storage shed burning in the middle of the block.
Flames shot skyward from the shed’s roof and licked up the side of a house in front. A bucket brigade had already formed to throw water on the nearby buildings. The shed and house were doomed. With a great clatter a fire engine arrived, eight men pulling the four-wheeled vehicle.
“Knickerbocker Five,” one of the firemen shouted as they stopped on the street in front of the burning buildings. “First again!” The volun teer firemen unrolled their hoses while two men leaped to man the pumper.
Duke Olmsted ran to the uniformed fire captain, who clapped him on the shoulder and pointed at the burning house. Duke ran to the porch and disappeared inside. Danny followed, dodging past restraining hands. Inside, he saw Duke at the top of the stairs. The other man paused, looking right and left, and Danny recalled Rhynne doing the same a few hours earlier at the top of the ramp leading to the Argonaut.
Danny looked around him. Smoke seeped into the hallway from one of the doors leading to the rear of the house, but the air was still comparatively clear. He raced from room to room, opening doors, calling out, looking to see if anyone was left in the building. He found no one.
When he came back to the front hall, Duke was just coming to the top of the stairs holding a handkerchief to his mouth. Danny positioned himself at the bottom of the staircase, took out his Colt and pointed it at Duke’s chest. The other man stopped and stared down at him.
“Lay that gun aside,” he said. “Are you mad?” Olmsted took a step toward him.
Danny fired to Duke’s left, the bullet splintering the stair rail. Olmsted drew back.
“You killed my father,” Danny told him. “And so I’m going to kill you.”
“I never killed a man in my life.” Duke looked at him, puzzled. A kind of comprehension cleared his face, but it was not the same understanding that Danny desired.
“I might have roistered a bit in my time,” Duke said. “I may have been in a brawl or two before I married. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in my life. I know I never killed a man. Why do you think I joined the Vigilantes? I want an end to all that.”
Danny cocked the pistol. He would shoot Olmsted and leave his body here in the burning house. No one would ever know he hadn’t perished in the fire.
The moment stretched endlessly. Olmsted stood on the stairs, his eyes never leaving the Colt in Danny’s hands, while the smoke drifted around them, the flames crackled in the rear of the house, and the men shouted in the street outside.
Danny remembered that fog-shrouded night when he and his father were set upon outside the saloon, remembered the duel with Sutton, the gun spinning from his hand, the fearful moment when he thought he’d been hit, Rhynne kneeling beside him, and now today, Rhynne, a prisoner of the Vigilantes, climbing the ramp to the Argonaut.
If he shot Olmsted, he’d be doing exactly what the Vigilantes intended to do to Rhynne. He’d be killing him out of hand, without proof, without a fair hearing. Without a hearing at all.
Danny eased the hammer of the pistol forward and tucked the gun into his belt.
“Perhaps I made a mistake,” he said. “I’m not sure you’re the man I’m looking for after all. If you are, may the death of my father be on your head for the rest of your days.” Olmsted drew a deep breath, coughing when he breathed in the smoke fumes. “We’d best be leaving here,” he said. “There was no one upstairs.”
“Nor down,” Danny said.
They walked out of the burning house together.
Later, Danny downed a whisky at the bar of the Golden Empire. He put down his glass, nodded to McSweeney, and they climbed the stairs to Rhynne’s office.
“We have two days, maybe three to free Rhynne,” Danny said. “No more, perhaps less.”
“Who’s to lead us in the attempt?” McSweeney asked.
Danny went around the desk and sat in Rhynne’s chair. “I am,” he said.
“You think you’re the lad for the job?”
“No,” Danny said quickly. “I’m not the lad for the job. I’m the man.”
He never saw Duke Olmsted again. Yet he knew that it was Duke and the way he had been able to handle the situation with Duke that let him call himself a man.