“No!” The protest burst from his lips with such vehemence that he quickly added, “I’m more than capable of applying liniment all on my own.”
Her eyes grew dark, causing a curious twisting sensation in his chest, but he pushed the reaction aside. He’d been to enough doctors and quacks to last a lifetime—and he certainly wasn’t about to add a female surgeon to the mix.
Even so, it was clear that Dr. Havisham was intent on gnawing the issue like a dog with a bone.
“But even if this complaint is one you’ve experienced before, you may have truly injured yourself today.”
He knew the last thing he needed was this woman pulling up his shirt to poke and prod at the scars on his back. Hadn’t he already seen what the sight did to the gentler sex?
Becca hadn’t been able to stomach the sight, even when the wounds had healed to pinkish scars. Jonah would be hanged before he’d allow another woman to get close enough to see them ever again.
“No. Thank you, Dr. Havisham,” he said with a firmness that bordered on rudeness. “Look, it’s late and I’m tired. Maybe you should tell me why you’re here.”
She didn’t immediately speak. Instead, she regarded him with narrowed eyes. Brown, brown eyes.
“You are a very stubborn man, Mr. Ramsey. I might be able to help you. My schooling included a course in the latest advances in surgery and—”
He sighed. “I think we already went through your many qualifications during your interview with Batchwell and Bottoms.”
“As you well know, I left that discussion without managing to impress upon either gentleman the full extent of my education.”
He knew she was reliving each harsh word that had been uttered in the mining office. Although Phineas Bottoms had seen fit to listen in placid silence, Ezra Batchwell had not been so reticent. He’d accused Dr. Havisham of fraud, dismissed her competence and had even questioned her sanity. Then he’d vowed to ruin her if she didn’t leave the valley as soon as humanly possible.
Although Jonah would have been the first to admit that the mine was no place for a woman, he thought that Batchwell had been a little harsh. As one of the fairer sex, she should have been offered a gentler dismissal.
“Dr. Havisham, why are you here in Aspen Valley?” he asked, dodging her question with one of his own. “What on earth possessed you to sign up for employment at a silver mine?”
She met his gaze with a directness he wasn’t accustomed to receiving from a woman.
“Why should I confide in you, Mr. Ramsey? I asked you the same question mere hours ago and you refused to answer.”
There was a note of challenge in those melodic tones, and old memories threatened to swamp him. He was transported to another life...the company of another woman. But all that was gone now. In the space of a heartbeat, the thunder of cannon and men’s screams, he’d been stripped of that future—as well as his ability to ever feel so deeply about another woman again.
Jerking his gaze away, Ramsey offered, “Like most of the men here, I came in search of a new start. And you, Dr. Havisham?”
She poked the edge of her biscuit with her fork. “I wanted to go where I could do some good.”
“But why here? You admitted to the owners that most of your actual doctoring was at a women’s hospital.” When she didn’t explain, he added, “To put it bluntly, you’ve spent the last few years of your career as a baby doctor. Why would you come to the only community that would have no need of such services?”
She made a show of cutting a piece of meat, and loading her fork. Then she slipped the food into her mouth and chewed with great thoroughness before saying, “There was nothing in the advertisement that stated women weren’t allowed to apply.”
“I would have thought the ‘no women’ clause that this mine is well known for having would have been a huge clue.”
“The miners are forbidden to have emotional entanglements. There was no mention of the support staff having a similar rule.”
She was purposely taking the conversation in circles, and they’d been through all that with Batchwell and Bottoms, so Jonah decided to cut to the chase. “But why do you want to work here, Dr. Havisham?”
She placed her plate on the table. She hadn’t eaten everything, but she’d come close.
“You spoke of the men coming to Batchwell Bottoms to better themselves, Mr. Ramsey. Am I to be excluded of the opportunity because of my sex?”
“Come now, Miss Havisham. Why would you come to a mining community famous for its exclusion of women?”
She finally met him in the eye. “I’ve spent my life knocking down fences, Mr. Ramsey. Perhaps I saw it as another fence.”
Jonah could tell from the soft flash of her eyes and the thread of steel in her tone that she was telling him the truth—at least a part of it. From what little he knew of her already, he supposed that she’d been rebelling against the narrow confines of her gender since the moment that her father had seen fit to give her a boy’s name. Had the man held it against her that she hadn’t been born male? Or had he blamed her somehow for her mother’s demise?
There was obviously more to her motives than a simple act of rebellion, but the tilt of her chin made it clear that she wouldn’t be telling him anytime soon, because she took a quick sip of her cocoa, then asked, “I came here tonight because I was wondering when you and your men would be returning to the wreckage.”
His brows rose. “That was your emergency?”
“Yes. When will you be going back?”
“Near as I can tell...next spring.”
“But you can’t! You and your men have to go back tomorrow!”
Jonah took a deep swig of the cocoa, nearly burning his tongue. “Why’s that?”
“We...the women...we need our things.”
He offered a bark of laughter. “I’m afraid that some dresses and petticoats aren’t worth the lives of my men.”
“It’s not just dresses and petticoats, Mr. Ramsey. The women were rescued wearing only the most basic of clothing. If we’re to be marooned here for days—possibly weeks—we’ll need those bags.”
“Why? According to Batchwell, none of you will be allowed beyond the hall steps until such time as we can convey all of you to the nearest town.”
Her eyes sparkled in the dim light of the lamp. For all intents and purposes, Dr. Havisham had been told that—contract or no contract—at the first possible convenience, she’d be sent packing.
“You and I both know that such an arrangement is unfeasible. At some point, the women will need to take the air.”
“They can take all the air they want. All they have to do is open a window.”
She shook her head. “That will never do. These women aren’t prisoners, Mr. Ramsey.”
“They aren’t exactly invited guests.”
“So they’re to be punished? From what I can see, the other passengers—the crew, the stranded farmers and businessmen, even the families—aren’t being held to the same constraints.”
Hoping to avoid a full-fledged argument, Jonah chose his words with care. “Not punished. Consider it...protected.”
“Protected? From what? Life?”
“This is a mining community, Dr. Havisham. By definition, that means that it is inhabited by a bunch of men.”
“Are your employees convicts? Of ill-repute?”
“No.”