Piercing eyes stared at her in frank amazement, probably doubting she could handle living in the jungle. Quite understandable. Men often looked at her like that when they first heard she was a doctor, underestimating her. The inevitable banter would follow while they tried to get her to admit she was joking. Last would be a final look of disgust or horror when they realized a member of the fairer sex had overstepped the bounds of propriety and actually studied human anatomy in detail.
She’d thought she’d hardened herself to the inevitable path that first encounter took. But for the first time in a long while, she regretted the disappointment she would soon see. Might as well get on with it.
She squared her shoulders and tilted her chin higher than her five foot four inches normally allowed her to see. “The Mission Board sent letters. Weren’t you informed of the impending arrival of Mrs. Smith and myself?”
His eyes flashed disbelief and despite his polite tone, she could see the resolve of his answer in the set of his jaw. “I was indeed informed of the arrival of two new mission workers, Miss O’Hara, one a physician. I just did not expect the Board to send women, because of the deadly history of the jungle interior. I’m afraid you’ve been sent to the wrong place. I simply cannot take someone so delicate and unsuitable for the dangers to the compound at Nynabo.”
Unsuitable? She wanted to laugh at the irony of being found lacking after having just left a frontline mobile field hospital for this man’s dangerous jungle. She took a deep breath to steady her voice. It wouldn’t do to sound shrill and create a negative opinion of herself. She needed this position; was, in fact, desperate for it.
“Obviously, Pastor Mayweather, we are both surprised to find someone whom we did not expect. But I assure you that while your opinion is no different than most other men in society, ones who do not carry Bibles at their ready, it is entirely unwarranted.”
Mary could only imagine what her dear mother would say if she could hear her now. She’d managed to keep a polite tone but still broken her mother’s cardinal rule—don’t challenge a man in charge. Her own loving mother had never found herself able to hold an opinion that wasn’t first that of her husband, Mary’s father.
Pastor Mayweather’s eyebrows raised and his mouth opened, drawing in breath for the next volley. Before he could launch it, a matronly older woman put her hand on his arm and pushed herself forward. Mary couldn’t help but catch the disapproving frown the woman gave him before smiling at her visitors.
“Welcome to Newaka.” Thick arms enveloped Mary in a hug and squeezed the breath right out of her. “I am Hannah Jansen. My husband Karl and I serve here at this station.”
Hannah Jansen was as plump and well-rounded as her husband was spare. Mary resisted the urge to check her ribs when the apple-cheeked matron stepped back. “I’m Dr. O’Hara. But you may call me Mary.” She telegraphed the stuffy Pastor Mayweather a look over Hannah’s shoulder that she hoped said, “And you may not.”
“Hannah, this is my friend and travel companion, Mrs. Clara Smith.”
Clara stepped toward them and smiled. “We introduced ourselves while you were meeting Pastor Mayweather, Dr. Mary.”
“Yes,” Hannah said. “Dr. Mary, this is my husband, Karl.” She pointed to the tall gentleman who had helped Clara from her hammock chair.
Karl stepped up and took one of her hands between his bony pair and pressed gently. His eyes twinkled with good humor that carried in his voice. “We are so pleased to have you, Dr. Mary. I can’t tell you how happy we are to finally be assigned a physician in our area.”
“Why thank you, Pastor Jansen. It’s very polite of you to say so.” Mary avoided looking at William. “Most men are less accepting of a female doctor.”
“We just didn’t expect such a beautiful young woman.” Karl chuckled and offered Mary his arm. “Let me show you and Mrs. Smith to our home. Someone will bring your bags in a moment.”
“Dr. O’Hara?”
Mary swung around and forced a civil smile in spite of William Mayweather’s serious countenance. “Yes?”
“Please don’t unpack more than the essentials. I plan on sending you back when the porters are ready to return. Or, if the Jansens don’t mind, you can wait here for a more suitable posting at one of the safer coastal stations. While I’m sure your skills are more than adequate, regrettably I cannot take you and your companion into the interior with me.”
Shock at his highhanded assumption froze Mary’s tongue into silence. Silence he must have taken for acceptance as he turned and walked away. The nerve of the man. Drop his little piece of emotional ordnance and walk off before the explosion hit. Good thing she didn’t intend to answer to him in this decision.
Disappointment laid itself heavily on his heart as William walked away from the two workers who should have been his entry back to Nynabo. With his back to the sun’s glare, despair managed to cloud his vision. He’d prayed about the workers God would have assigned to Nynabo. But where was God in this obvious mistake? What reason could He have to delay William’s return to Nynabo? Was this some sort of test or temptation? He wouldn’t have believed it, but Dr. O’Hara, with her long, red locks and smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose, was even more beautiful than his beloved Alice.
William stopped short at the base of the porch steps. Where did those traitorous observations come from? He ran a hand through his unruly black mane and rebuked himself. Widowed only a year and reacting to a pretty face. It wouldn’t do.
He took the porch steps two at a time and entered the relative cool of the mission house. If he was so easily noticing this woman’s beauty, he would have to flee temptation’s possibilities. If it wasn’t inhumane to the porters, he would’ve ordered them to simply turn around and start back. Even if he could have done so, Hannah and Karl would have none of it. Basic hospitality dictated that the women be fed and rested along with their carriers.
He understood Hannah welcoming another woman with open arms, but he’d been shocked when Karl reacted kindly, as if not seeing the obvious problems. The fatherly man had heard William’s heart many times on the subject since he’d returned from his stateside leave. Well, he would have a man-to-man talk with Karl later, and then William would make sure that both women went on their way back the moment the porters were rested.
A lilting laugh flowed through the open windows. The petite doctor no doubt. The sound stirred the buried pain of the lost laughter of another precious woman, one he’d buried at Nynabo. He had no intentions of burying another woman there. The jungle’s interior was just not the place for a delicate female.
Oh, Mary O’Hara had pluck. He’d give her that. But she also had no true understanding of the dangers of practicing medicine among hostile natives, most of whom had never seen a white person of either gender before. This time he’d make sure a member of the fairer sex didn’t die on his watch. The sooner she was sent packing toward the safer coastal regions the better. Even if she stayed here at Newaka, it would be substantially safer than Nynabo.
William made a quick decision. He would spend as little time as possible in her company. It would alleviate some of the guilt he would inevitably feel at crushing her dreams of working in the interior. With that thought in mind, he headed through the kitchen, out the back door and around to the boys’ dormitory. There would be enough work there to legitimately occupy him until the women were settled in for the night.
Later, he could talk to Karl and make arrangements. The Mission Board’s policy on malaria would force him to stay longer here at Newaka until replacements could come or William contracted his first bout of the inevitable disease. There