Mercy mixed the first dose of the herbal medication her mother had taught her to concoct, which was better than any patented medicine she’d tried. “Now, Missy, thee must drink this in order to get better.”
“I want my mama.” The little girl’s face wrinkled up in fear. “Mama. Mama.”
Mercy picked up the child and cradled her in her arms. “Thy mama’s right beside the door, see?” Mercy turned so the child could glimpse her mother. “She wants me to make thee better. Now this will taste a little funny, but not that bad. I’ve taken it many times. Now here, take a sip, Missy. Just a little sip, sweet child.”
Missy stared into Mercy’s eyes. Then she opened her mouth and began to sip the chalky medicine. She wrinkled her nose at the taste but kept on sipping until the small cup was empty.
“Excellent, Missy. Thee is a very good girl. Now I’m going to lay thee down again, and thy mama will come and sit with thee. I will be giving thee more medicine soon.”
“It tasted funny.”
“I know but thee drank it all, brave girl.”
About half an hour later, Mercy was kneeling beside the man who had burst into the saloon and was still unconscious. She carefully gave him a dose of saline water. It seemed a pitiful medicine to combat such a deadly contagion. But it was the only thing she knew of that actually did something to counteract cholera’s disastrous effect on the human body. And no one even knew why. There’s so much that I wish I knew—that I wish someone knew.
It was nearly dawn when she heard her name and glanced up to see Lon Mackey. “Did thee find this man’s wife?”
His face sank into grimmer lines. “She’s dead.”
The news twisted inside Mercy. She shook her head over the loss of another life. Then she motioned for him to lean closer to her. She whispered, “We must find the source or this disease will kill at least half in this community.”
The stark words sank like rocks from her stomach to her toes. She forced herself to go on. “That is the usual death rate for unchecked cholera. Has thee found out anything that gives us a hint of the source?”
“I’ve talked to everyone. The little girl’s mother told me something I’ve heard from several of the others.”
“What is that?” Mercy asked, turning to concentrate on slowly infusing saline into the man’s vein.
“Wild blackberry juice was served at the church a week ago Sunday. There was a reception for the children’s Sunday-school recitation,” he murmured.
Mercy looked up into his face. “Wild blackberry juice? Who made it?”
“It was a concoction Mrs. McCall made from crushed berries, their good well water and sugar. Mrs. McCall was the wife of the first victim. And the whole of his family was ailing first and all succumbed.”
Mercy sat back on her heels. Closing her eyes, she drew in a slow breath, trying to calm her racing heart. Lon Mackey may have found her the answer. “That tells me what I need to know. Thee must do exactly as I say. Will thee?”
Hours ago Lon wouldn’t have done anything a female stranger told him to do. But he would do whatever Mercy Gabriel asked. He just hoped it would work—passions were running high outside the saloon. “What must I do?”
“Go to the McCall house and examine the water source. Examine the house and the grounds with great care. Take a healthy man with thee as a witness.”
“What am I looking for?” he asked, leaning closer. The faint fragrance of lavender momentarily distracted him from her words.
“After the 1834 cholera epidemic, New York State passed laws forbidding the discarding of animal carcasses in or near any body of water. Does that help thee?” she asked.
Without a word of doubt, Lon rose and strode outside. He motioned to the bartender, Tom Banks, who was adding wood to the fire under the kettle of water the Quaker required to be kept boiling. “We’ve got a lead on what might have caused the cholera. Come with me. She told me what to look for and where,” Lon said.
The two of them hurried down the empty street. Dawn was breaking and normally people would be stirring, stepping outside. But every shop in town was closed up tight and all the houses were eerily quiet. No children had played outside for days now. Even the stray dogs lying in the alleys looked bewildered.
“Do you think this Quaker woman, this female doctor, knows what she’s doing?” the bartender asked.
Lon shrugged. “Proof’s in the pudding,” he said. But if he had to wager, his money would be on Mercy Gabriel.
At the McCalls, the two of them walked around the empty house to the well. He was used to violent death and destruction but the unnatural silence and creeping dread of cholera was getting to him. Everything was so still.
“The Quaker told me to examine the well and any other water source.”
“Doesn’t she know that contagions come from bad air?” Tom objected.
“She knows more than we do,” Lon replied. “Every time I talk to her, I know more about this scourge than I did before.” Of course, that didn’t mean she could save everyone. In times like these, however, he’d found that a show of assurance could avert the worst of hysteria. He didn’t want anyone else bursting into the saloon and letting loose with a rifle.
The two of them approached the well. It was a primitive affair with the pump sitting on a rough wooden platform.
“I don’t know what we’ll find that’s not right,” Tom grumbled. “From what I heard, the McCalls always had sweet water. That’s why they always brought the juice.”
Lon stared down at the wooden platform. Part of it was warping and lifting up. “Let’s find a crow-bar or hammer.” They went to the barn and found both. Soon they were prying up the boards over the McCalls’ well.
Both of them cursed when they saw what was floating in the water.
They cleaned out the well and then pumped water for a good half hour. Then they capped the well cover down as tight as they could. Tom and Lon walked silently back to the saloon. Lon hit the swinging door first and with great force, his anger at the senseless loss of life fueling a furious fire within. The two swinging panels cracked against the wall. Every head turned.
Lon crossed to the Quaker doctor. “We found dead rats floating in the McCalls’ well.”
The Quaker rose to face him, looking suddenly hopeful. “That would do it. Had the well cover become compromised?”
“It was warped and loose.”
She sighed and closed her eyes. “We need to find out if everyone who is ill has been brought here. Anyone who drank the juice or who came in contact with a person falling ill from it should be checked. Then we need to make sure that every house where the illness has presented is scrubbed completely with hot water with a high concentration of lye soap.”
“That will end this?” Lon studied her earnest face, hoping against hope that she would say yes.
“If we kill off all the bacteria that carry the disease, the disease will stop infecting people. The bacteria most likely move from surface to surface. I believe that in order to become ill, a person must ingest the contaminated water or come into contact with something an infected person has touched. Does thee need anything more from me to proceed?”
“No, you’ve made yourself quite clear.”
She