Rio Grande Wedding Part 27

"I've been thinking about your chickens," she said.

"Yes?"

"If you want to build a henhouse and try it, I guess I might like having a rooster alarm clock."

He laughed happily. "That's good! Yes, you will like it. We can find out today who has them for sale." He sipped his coffee. "We will go see Josefina, no?"

"Of course."

"And will you go to work?"

"No. Cathy gave me two weeks off to take care of all this."

"Good. I would like to work, I think. I am tired of sitting and sitting. You have things I can fix here, no? That dripping sink, maybe?"

She smiled. "Sure. I'll put you to work. Get everything shipshape before you go off to real life."

Real life. It seemed, suddenly, as he admired her in her garden, with sun falling down on her many-colored head, a very bleak prospect.

Chapter 10.

They spent most of the day with Josefina, who was, in the way of sick children the world over, cranky and irritable at the confinement. She insisted she felt fine, that she just wanted to go home and see her dog.

Atnoon, Molly ducked out to go to the local five-and-dime. She bought a basket and filled it with all kinds of little-girl things coloring books and paper dolls, crayons and markers, a pretty doll with some extra outfits. Remembering Alejandro's comment about Josefina's intelligence, she also picked out some easy readers and a math workbook.

On the way out, she stopped by the stuffed animals to pick out a dog. It was surprising how many there were. Remembering Wiley's comments about a little mutt, she found a small brown-and-white one with a felt tongue hanging out of its smiling mouth.

At the checkout, she grinned at the checker, a woman in her sixties whose children Molly had baby-sat during her teens. "Hi, Mrs. Nolan. How're the boys?"

The blue eyes were cold behind her gla.s.ses. "They're just fine, thank you."

Molly's immediate impulse was to try to make things right explain her actions, paste on her brightest fake smile and remind the woman that she was still Molly Sheffield, everybody's favorite girl next door.

She resisted. "I'm glad," she said as if she had not noticed the hostility. "Please tell them I said h.e.l.lo."

There was no reply. Feeling vaguely triumphant over her ability to remain strong in the face of community disapproval, Molly paid and drove back to the hospital.

At the desk, she stopped to talk to the floor nurse. "How's she doing, Annie?"

Annie, aLatinain her twenties, fresh from nursing school, shook her head. "It's TB for sure. The tests came back." She sighed heavily. "The worry now is infection. She has an elevated white-cell count, and the doctor is concerned about pneumonia."

"I see. Did you tell her uncle?"

"Yeah. He seemed very worried about it. Maybe you can rea.s.sure him that we should be able to treat it with no trouble." Annie glanced over her shoulder and leaned close.

"Where did you find him? He's absolutely gorgeous! I want one."

Molly laughed and wiggled her eyebrows. "He doesn't have a brother, but maybe a cousin, huh?"

Annie sighed. "And he's so polite. I never meet polite men."

"I'd better get in there if he's worrying." Molly hauled the basket off the counter and went down to the room. When she pushed open the door, her gaze fell first on Alejandro, standing at the bedside, reading a ragged copy of a picture book to Josefina. He halted at a word, and shook his head. "This one, I don'tknow,hija . You have to help me."

Josefina laughed. "It'swhite ,Tio . You know that."

"Oh,white! Sure, sure, I see now." He looked up and caught Molly's eye. "Lucky for me I have such a smart child to help me, huh?" His tone was light, but Molly saw the lines of strain around his mouth. And a moment later, when Josefina coughed, the sound deep and obviously painful, Molly understood why.

Still, no good would come of him wearing himself out entirely. His own health was fragile. "Did your uncle eat, like I told him to?" Molly asked Josefina.

"No." Molly saw with concern that there was a faint sheen on her forehead. "I told him to, but he wouldn't."

"I ate your pudding!"

"Big deal, right, kiddo?" Molly put the basket on the side of the bed and took out a bag of hamburgers. "I'm pretty smart, too." She gave Alejandro the bag and a cola, and started taking out the other things for Josefina, who was quite happy with all of it, especially the little dog, but tired so quickly that Molly was genuinely alarmed. "You want to just watch some TV for a little while, kiddo?"

Josefina nodded. Molly clicked on the set, found some cartoons and tucked blankets around the girl more carefully. She inclined her head toward the door, looking at Alejandro, and he stood. "We'll be back in a few minutes, little one,okay ?"

The child, hand tucked under her chin, nodded dully.

In the hall, he said, "Tell me."

Molly knew better than to mince words with him. "It looks like pneumonia. We have to let her rest. If you don't want to leave the hospital entirely, I can understand that, but you have to take care of yourself, too. You can't let yourself get too tired."

"I am well now."

"No," she said firmly. "You really are not. And if you'd like to be back in bed, flat on your back, keep skipping meals and worrying."

A faint grin turned up one side of his mouth, and he touched her upper arm with one finger. "Bossy."

"You'd better believe it."

But unfortunately, Josefina's condition worsened dramatically over the next couple of hours. By supper, she was moved to ICU, with oxygen, and permitted a visitor only once an hour for ten minutes.

Alejandro stood there for the whole ten minutes each hour. Most of that time, she was

sleeping and he could only hold her hand, murmuring prayers, over and over. Reckless prayers, offered in desperation to all the saints he could remember. He listened tothe swoosh and beeps of the machines with a sense of breathlessness, as if it were his own chest infected. He wished it was. He took the medal off his neck and put it around her wrist, and prayed some more.

In between, he dozed in the waiting room, and Molly stayed with him, holding his hand sometimes, attempting to rea.s.sure him. She left for a while and came back with food, which he ate mechanically. He wanted to send her away, wished he did not need her again, so soon, that one day, somehow; he would be the strong one. She would think him a weak man indeed, and he was not.

Finally, a little pastmidnight, the fever broke and Josefina seemed out of danger for a little while. The doctor, reporting the news in a face that seemed sincere, told Alejandro this would be a good time to go home and get some sleep. "Maybe by the time you come back in the morning, she'll be able to eat with you."

"You will tell her I am coming back? And if she-"

"I'll call you." The doctor looked at Molly with a smile Alejandro found vaguely insulting, and he scowled, tugging his arm away from Molly's hand. They were treating him as if he were the child.

"Does my worry amuse you?" he asked pointedly.

"On the contrary, Mr. Sosa, I find it refreshing." The doctor pursed her lips.