Kitty's long eyelashes fluttered open. She immediately gasped with pain.
"Kitty?!"
Looking in the direction of the voice and by chance at the other surroundings, she realized that she was lying in Doc's spare room bed, dressed in a white cotton nightgown, and covered with a quilt. On one side of the bed, Doc sat in a chair, holding her left hand in his own. On the opposite side, Matt Dillon sat in another chair, clasping her right hand even more tenderly. Both men looked absolutely exhausted and haggard.
She instinctively tried to sit up. Another wave of pain engulfed her.
"Now, now, just lie back, and take it easy," Doc kindly ordered. He stood up, and with infinite gentleness, put his hands on her shoulders, preventing her from trying anything else. "You were in a stagecoach accident, Kitty. They brought you back home to us."
The pieces of memory fell into place, and Kitty recalled the precipice, the accident…and her condition.
"You've…you've examined me, then," she whispered, fearfully. She knew that the excellent physician was not in the habit of missing diagnoses. Had he found out?
"Yes, and I know that you are a very sick girl. Here, take a drink of water. You badly need it."
Instead of placing her lips on the edge of the cup that Doc held out near her face, Kitty turned away from it and gazed at him reproachfully.
"You knew, and you let him sit here with me?" she cried out, suddenly snatching her right hand from the marshal's. "How could you?"
"Kitty, I – what?" the physician stammered.
"Kitty, he didn't know-" Matt began, about to explain to her that Doc Adams had not known that their relationship had been broken off, and that he had only intruded into her sickroom because he still loved her and needed to know that she would be alright.
"He just said that he did!" the redhead sobbed, almost hysterically. Gazing up at the doctor, she burst out, "Do you know what I went through to protect him? And you, a medical professional, just allowed him to sit here for hours on end, breathing in air full of consumption!"
"Consumption!" the physician exclaimed, staring at her in shock. "You think you have consumption? Whatever gave you such a ridiculous notion?"
"Your own friend, Dr. Gilberts of Saint Louis," Kitty retorted, her voice breaking due to emotion and weakness. "You told me yourself that you value his opinion, that you would allow him to treat you, and that you have sent several cases of yours to him for second opinions. So now spare me any pretenses-"
"Pretenses, my foot!" Doc replied, just as passionately. "My friend, Dr. Gilberts, died a year ago!" Kitty stared at him as if he were a madman. "But if you went to his old practice you probably saw his nephew, Dr. Harold Gilberts, a nitwit who could not diagnose a cold if a patient sneezed in his face!"
"But…but…I have been feeling so poorly…I am sure…"
"I'll tell you why you have been feeling so poorly," the physician retorted. He grasped a container of face-powder from the bedside table and showed it to her. "I got this out of your purse. You have been using it, I daresay."
"How could that have anything to do with my cough?" Kitty murmured in disbelief.
"Because it's loaded with arsenic, a highly toxic poison, young lady," the physician informed her. "It's been used in women's cosmetics for years, but apparently this brand overdid it, because the medical journals have published at least three reports of women in England dying from its use. So they stopped selling it over there and sent what was left of their inventory to Kansas and Nebraska and Colorado, and peddled it to unsuspecting ladies such as yourself. You breathe it in when powdering your face in the morning, and it irritates your lungs. Then you touch your face during the course of the day, get a bit on your fingers, and use them to put food into your mouth, and you have just ingested a hefty dose of poison. Look, just look at your palms. See those dark spots? That is a symptom of arsenic poisoning, not consumption. You've been having terrible leg cramps, yes? Again, a symptom much more in line with arsenic toxicity, not consumption."
Reeling from this revelation, the stunned woman could not even bring herself to ask the fateful question. But Doc read it in her eyes.
"It will be a hard recovery, Kitty, both from the stagecoach accident and the poisoning. But if you take my advice, drink all the detoxifying medicines that I require you to take, and, of course, stop using the face powder, there is a very good chance that you will fully recover. It may take a while for the symptoms to go away, but if the arsenic hasn't kill you yet, then it won't, provided you don't breathe in or ingest any more of it. Now, I am going to get you something for the pain. I will be back in a few minutes."
With that, he went into the other room and closed the door behind him, leaving the couple alone.
She turned her head and looked at the man who had been observing and listening intently. His eyes caught her blue ones.
"So…you thought you were dying from consumption," he said, as if he were understanding something for the first time. "Would that have anything to do with the letter you sent me?"
"Oh Matt," she murmured. "I…I didn't want to risk your health, and to have you see me getting sicker and sicker…and be a burden to you…"
"Kitty," he responded in a soft, low tone, repossessing her hand and switching his seat from that of the chair to the edge of her bed, "I love you too much for you to ever, ever have been a burden! As hard as it would be to…to watch you slipping away, it was harder to be brushed aside in your attempt to spare me. It hurts that you did not trust me enough to be near you when you were vulnerable, and to allow me to bear your troubles with you…but I have no one to blame but myself. After all, I never made the vow to be true to you for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, did I? My Kitty, once you are strong enough, would…would you please allow me to take you to church and make those vows to you?"
"Are you asking me to marry you?" the redhead gasped.
"That is exactly what I am doing. Say you will, Kitty!"
"Matt, of course I will!"
She reached out and wrapped her arms around his neck, and drew him down towards herself. In the next second, their lips met, and she felt herself getting another kiss from the man whom she thought she would never, ever see again.
….
Doc had been right. Kitty's recovery was a long, arduous process, but within a few weeks, her bruises faded, and her cramps and cough diminished. Then one sunny morning, her appetite returned, and she found herself asking for eggs and bacon.
Matt spent as much time at her bedside as his duties allowed, and bestowed many smiles and kisses on her. Ma Smalley, Festus and Sam made up part of the steady stream of visitors which amused her when the marshal had to step away.
And then, finally, one day, Doc teasingly told her that he was evicting her from his infirmary, and gave her permission to move back to her rooms at the Long Branch.
...
A week later, Dodge celebrated the most memorable wedding of the decade. People whom Matt had helped throughout the years came from all over Kansas to wish the newlyweds well. The blushing bride was a beautiful picture in her white dress and lace veil. Doc escorted her down the aisle, and beamed with such pride that one would have thought that he had just given away his own daughter to a most deserving husband.
Even the most unromantic old farmers and cowhands felt a thrill going down their spines when they heard the Marshal's voice trembling with emotion as he said,
"I, Matthew, take you, Kathleen, for my lawful wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until death do us part."
And there was barely a dry eye in the house when Kitty responded,
"I, Kathleen, take you, Matthew, for my lawful husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until death do us part."
Smiling, the priest said,
"May the Lord in his kindness strengthen the consent you have declared before the Church, and graciously bring to fulfillment His blessing within you.
What God joins together, let no one put asunder."
Their rings were blessed and exchanged, and then, a sight that Dodge had been expecting to see for years finally occurred: Matt Dillon leaned forward, and in full view of the public, kissed Kitty tenderly.
The cheers which accompanied the newlyweds as they walked down the church steps were deafening. Front Street was entirely barricaded off for the rest of the day and night. The crowd danced the night away in the street, and ate so much wedding cake that even Festus declared that he was unable to swallow another bite.
At the end of it all, Matt and Kitty were helped into a lovely buggy decorated with hundreds of white ribbons. Matt took the reins and caused the horses to break into a trot. The two of them were going to spend their honeymoon in a little cabin a few miles outside of town, which the marshal had purchased at a low price and renovated as a present for his bride. They meant to spend most of their near-future in town, living in Kitty's rooms at the Long Branch, but they both knew that there would come times when they just wanted to be alone together outside of Dodge, and the little cabin would provide them that opportunity. Besides, when their little family began to grow, it would be mighty useful to have a more sedate, quiet home in which to rock the babies to sleep!
Kitty clung to her husband as the buggy drove through the meadows and the moonlight. She thought of how close she had come to leaving this world. Ever since her recovery, even the simplest things - breezes, flowers, the ability to walk ten steps - seemed like a luxury. And her feelings of gratitude were magnified a thousandfold on this, her long-desired wedding day!
"Do you know something, Matt?" she murmured.
"What is it?" the bridegroom asked her, looking down at his redheaded wife with devotion.
"Life is wonderful."
"That it is," the lawman conceded, slipping an arm around her shoulders as they drove on. "That it is, Kitty."
THE END
Based on my brief research, it appears that in the 1800s it was pretty common for cosmetics to have a little bit of arsenic in them in order to give women pale skin as a result of their use. Of course, most women did not die from it...but it is theoretically possible that if they had made a mistake in production the arsenic concentration may have gotten high enough to cause problems :D
Hope you enjoyed this slightly far-fetched story!