Bluebonnet Belle. Lori Copeland

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СКАЧАТЬ Pinkhams had given up their grand house in Glenmere and moved to a smaller home on Western Avenue in Lynn, and recently, with what little resources they possessed, begun their vegetable compound effort. Marketing the elixir was now a family venture. Everyone contributed to the enterprise. Dan and Will provided the brains and sinew. Lydia made the medicine. Charles and Aroline turned over their wages to help pay for herbs. And together, Will and Lydia had worked up advertising copy and put out relevant pamphlets. Even Isaac contributed. Sitting in his rocker, he folded and bundled the pamphlets for Dan to hand out.

      Gray was told that at first Lydia had made the compound for friends. Before long women were coming from far away to purchase it. Now the family had expanded the manufacture of the elixir, and Gray was worried. Pinkham’s business was growing. More and more women were forsaking a visit to the doctor in favor of self-medicating with the Pinkham compound.

      The newspapers were full of ads for remedies like Wright’s Indian Vegetable Pills, Oman’s Boneset Pills, Vegetine and Hale’s Honey of Horehound and Tar.

      Natural remedies had gained wide popularity, and Gray wasn’t sure how the growing tide could be stemmed.

      Today, looking around at the crowd, he felt his worries were well founded.

      “Just try the compound for thirty days—”

      “Excuse me,” Gray called out above the growing din, interrupting Mrs. Pinkham’s sales pitch. “Ladies…”

      The sound level lessened enough for him to be heard.

      “If you believe in potions, you’re placing your health in untrained hands! Your faith is better placed in educated physicians—”

      He’s just like all the others, April thought, irritated.

      A voice from the back interrupted. “My doctor says I have to ‘put up with pain’ because it’s ‘woman’s lot,’” she parroted. “Is that fair? Aren’t we deserving of more concern?”

      That’s what Mama should have done, April thought. Put up with the heavy bleeding until she could find something like Lydia’s tonic. The memory of her mother’s surgery and ensuing death fed April’s anger at the situation in which many women found themselves.

      “Of course you are,” Gray stated. “But you must be patient! We’re looking for remedies….”

      “He’s as blind as all the others,” April murmured, her hands balling into tight fists. This arrogant man was going to be a thorn in her side, she could see that.

      “My doctor prefers to talk to my husband, as if I didn’t have enough sense to know what he’s speaking about!”

      “And it was one of those ‘educated physicians’ who let my mother die,” April blurted.

      When Gray’s gaze swung to her, she wished she’d kept her temper in better control. Ordinarily she avoided drawing attention to herself, but today she couldn’t help it. He was a rude, boorish…man! She met his gaze, lifting her chin in defiance.

      “I say we take responsibility for our own bodies,” a tall, heavyset woman declared. “I’m buying two bottles right now.”

      The crowd shifted restlessly, and April watched the onslaught coming toward her with growing alarm. She braced herself, her gaze darting about for a quick escape if things got out of hand. Boxes of compound were stacked to her right, two bramble bushes grew to her left. Mentally groaning, she feverishly searched for an out. She’d have to make a break for the middle, and run straight at…him.

      She was sure Gray Fuller would recognize her now. Grandpa might look like a genial old Santa Claus without the beard, but when he was riled he didn’t have that jolly old person’s mild temperament.

      Far from it. The rotund octogenarian had a razor-sharp wit and a tongue to match.

      April was jolted back to the present as the crowd bore down on her, attempting to squeeze between the table holding the vegetable compound and boxes of the product.

      Aware that she wasn’t going to be able to get out of their way quickly enough, she braced herself for the attack.

      A robust matron hit her sideways, knocking her into the heavily laden table. Stumbling, her hand flailing for support, April braced again as she was slammed from the other side. When yet another hard bump came from the rear, she fell against the table, knocking bottles of compound over in a domino effect.

      Reaching out, she tried to save the batch of tonic from ruin, but the table legs collapsed, and it and the bottles tumbled to the ground with a thunderous crash of splitting boards and breaking glass.

      The women kept coming, undaunted.

      April was pushed forward onto the splintered table and broken bottles whose sticky contents were draining onto the earth below. She hit the ground with a thump.

      Attempting to get up, she was knocked aside, whacking her head on a piece of wood. Pain shot through her temple and everything went blurry as she fell back, clasping her palm to her eye.

      Silence fell over the crowd as all heads turned to her wilted figure.

      “Oh, my!” a shrill voice exclaimed. “She’s fainted!”

      April hadn’t, but she certainly wished she had. Not only had she humiliated herself, she was going to have a whale of a headache.

      Moaning, she stirred ever so slightly at the feel of a cool hand on her cheek. She kept her eyes tightly closed, wishing everyone would leave her alone so she could just crawl away, unnoticed.

      “Is she injured?”

      “Oh, my, my.” A hand gently fanned her face. “Someone bring me a dipper of water!”

      “Stand back!” another woman cried. “This man says he’s a doctor!”

      April froze when she heard his voice. Drat. Now she’d really done it. Of course Dr. Fuller would offer his services!

      “Someone get this table out of the way.” Gray Fuller waded through the crowd, issuing orders. “One of you ladies loosen her collar. Please, the rest of you stand back and give her some air.”

      April felt the pressure of four manly fingers rest against her neck for a brief moment. A pleasant woodsy scent drifted down to her, and she wondered why he smelled so good when other men smelled like…like…well, men.

      Embarrassed, she groaned in frustration at the situation she’d gotten herself into. Most of the women she knew would give their eyeteeth to draw the handsome doctor’s attention. She might feel the same if the circumstances were different. She’d hoped to be introduced to him at church, or a social function, not while lying on the ground surrounded by broken glass and brown, sticky goo.

      Pressing his head to her chest, he pretended to listen for a heartbeat as he whispered, “You’re going to have to groan louder. They didn’t hear you.”

      April’s left eye flew open, then quickly closed. “Wh…what?”

      Lifting his head, he grinned.

      Cracking her eye open once more, April looked up into a pair of СКАЧАТЬ