He had spotted her as she rode her horse up through the square, dismounting at the notice board to look at the requests pinned up by the townspeople.
"Perfect, ive been meaning to catch you! You have been here a little while now, and you have come due for your annual checkup." He hustled her into the clinic with little protest and they set up in the small back room. The farmer shrugged off her jacket to show bandages on her arms.
"What the?" Harvey exclaimed as he peeled them back to show a nasty burn, with a variety of cuts and bruises oddly in the shape of bite marks. He recognized a bat bite, but the rest could be from bugs, lizards or any other manor of strange wildlife.
"Where you just going to have these wounds and not come to see me? How long since you got these?" His disapproval was clear in his stern voice and the farmer shrank a bit in her chair.
"Day before yesterday," She mumbled, "Willy has been showing me around the ginger isles, and I ran into a bit more than expected in these volcanic caves I found." She mumbled her word and winced when he washed at one of the deeper cuts.
"Willy has been talking about fixing that boat for years, no one from town has even thoughts about setting foot on those isles. But you move to town and within only a year it's a regular stomping ground for you, and everybody in town is now talking about how they want to visit." He smooth voice was a good distraction and quickly he had clean and put new dressings on the burn marks on her arms.
He worked through the general checkup, looking at hearing, vision, her measurements, her blood type. When he went to check her heartrate it was beating fast, he raised a brow as there eyes met through his glasses.
"I guess I'm a little nervous doc." She said with a slight chuckle that changed the atmosphere in the room for the pair. He was remembering trying to kiss her here in the reception last fall as he looked down at her over his charts.
"Hum, well that's all to look at today, you seem well aside from the obvious wounds gotten fighting with yoba knows what. You need to look after yourself, don't over work yourself on the farm, and don't bit off more than you can chew in those mines your so fond of exploring." His voice was more curt than it needed to be but still his little speech made her smile, and straighten up a bit.
"I'll try take your advise to heart doc but I can't help but to explore this place, its has so many interesting stores to tell." She smiled back at Harvey and he was hit by a wave of curiosity, he looked at her for a moment with a long considering gaze.
"What is so great about those mines that keeps you risking life and limb in there?" He couldn't help but asked, the thought had bothered him many night where she had landed in his clinic. "Is some metal and gemstones worth this risk to your health?" His clinic al voice was surprisingly gentle, making the Farmer blush shyly. Then her face changed to a tentative smile as she rummaged in her side bag for a moment, a large clanking thing she was never without. From its depths she pulled out a gleaming bar of metallic purple, offering it to him like she had with many a gift before. He stared at it with distrust.
"This has been the cause of some of those scrapes but seems pretty worth it to me. Its Iridium, hard to find but amazing material to work with to make things strong, light and durable, or at least that's what Clint tells me." Harvey looked closer at the metal bar, holding it up to the florescent surgery lights to see its shine, he turned back to her with a lowered brow.
"Hmmm, are you sure this is healthy? Taking hits in the mine, so you can make a better pickaxe out of some magic metal to go deeper and get into more dangerous fights, doesn't sound it to me." He took a long look at the periodic table on his wall, "How come no one else knows about this amazing material?"
"I wouldn't got around telling too many people doc, if Joja got wind that this was near town they would strip mine all Ginger Isle to get it all out, this stuff is rare. And even this much took a bit of work to get"
His disapproval range clear and the farmer's face fell, shaking her head with what seemed more like disappointment over Harvey's reaction rather than remorse on her part.
She stood and shrugged back on her jacket and bag; she pulled her green cap low over her eyes. She nodded to him and after some final pleasantries she left. Harvey heard her chatting to Maru in reception on the way out. Harvey sighed, slumping into his chair and looking at the block of metal sitting on his desk.
Did the farmer really smelt this herself? He had visited Clints shop last winter and seen him casting copper ore down into metal ingots, he couldn't picture the farmer doing the same over a hot forge. His mind wandering as she wrote up the last of the consult notes he wandered out to reception to see how Maru was getting on. She was happy to see him, telling him about her survey of the night sky last night by her telescope.
"Say Maru, you ever come across iridium in your research, meant to make things, stronger, but still light and durable?" He asked her and she gaped in surprise.
"Of course Harvey, if you want to get into advanced componentry that stuff it ideal! But its far to pricy for me to get my hands on." Her face feel, she was always transparent with what she thought. He smiled as he reached into his grey slacks and brought out the bar. Reached over he placed it on the desk in front of her large, amazed eyes.
"Well, here you go Maru, will be interesting to hear what you can make it into. I'm told it's the real thing." She hardly took in his words as her mouth dropped in awe and she picked up the bar, feeling it for density and heft.
"Is that seriously iridium? Oh wow, Harvey this is spectacular!" She squealed with glee and leaped up, leaning over the counter to wrap him in a quick one-armed hug that surprised Harvey and left his glasses a little askew. Chuffed with her response he straightened his glasses and tie.
"You should be thanking the farmer for it; she told me she dug it out of the ground herself." But Maru could hardly listen as she launched into a plan for modifications to her telescope to alter the light array, and Harvey found himself nodding along fondly to her ideas. He asked a few questions of her, probing to find out more about this iridium and Maru promised to bring him a textbook she had been studying with her father when she came in for her next shift as she said farewell to him for the night. He went to bed that night thinking fondly of Maru's excited reaction, but he dreamed of dark mines filled with bugs and the farmer stalking though them doing as she pleased and collecting treasure.