Free The Doctor's Newfound Family by Valerie Hansen

you may also become my amanuensis and help me keep proper records.”
    Her countenance sobered as she began to fully comprehend what he was saying. “The possible loss of life, you mean?”
    “Yes. Medicine is not the science it may one day become. We’re learning new things all the time. A few years ago, a doctor in Austria proposed that something as simple as hand washing might prevent hospital fever.”
    Intrigued, Sara Beth hung on his every word. “Really? How?”
    “No one knows. Many doubt him, but the man has the statistics to back up his conclusion. I, for one, see no reason not to employ the technique. It certainly can’t hurt.”
    “In that case, I’m thankful this property has its own well. That water the trucks deliver to most of the city is fetid, especially as the days warm in the summer.”
    “I’ve been using a diluted chlorine solution,” Taylor said. “When a few drops are mixed with any water, everything clears, even odor, though I wouldn’t recommend that anyone drink it.” He displayed his palm. “It’s hard on the skin if you don’t wash it off, so it can’t be good for the gut. Don’tworry. You won’t be actually touching any very ill patients, just writing down my findings for me.”
    “I’ll do whatever you say. I want to make myself useful.” His warm smile in reply blessed her.
    “Then let’s start by seeing how our little patients are doing today,” Taylor said.
    He held the door for her and Sara Beth walked boldly into the sickroom. Dealing with ill children was going to be harder than peeling potatoes or drawing well water to supply the kitchen, but at least here she’d feel needed.
    One look at the wan, coughing child in the nearest bed, however, almost caused her to change her mind. Only a sincere desire to help the doctor and the children kept her steps steadfast.
     
    “Have you seen this?” Bein shouted, throwing the crumpled sheets of the Bulletin onto James Casey’s desk at the office of the Herald .
    “Calm down, William. He’s just stirring the pot. There’s nothing he can prove.”
    “You wouldn’t be so complacent if it were you he was slandering.”
    The younger, thinner man shrugged. “As a matter of fact, one of my spies tells me King is planning to do exactly that.”
    “You have skeletons in your closet?”
    Casey guffawed. “You might say so. I was not always the upright businessman you see before you.”
    “There are no upright businessmen in this room,” Bein countered. “Myself included. And proud of it, if you must know. Besides, you just got elected city supervisor. If he’d had anything on you, he’d surely have revealed it before the election.”
    “True. But one never knows what unwelcome information may yet surface. I was not exactly a model citizen of New York.”
    “Just because you spent some time in Sing Sing prison? Nobody’s perfect.”
    “I’ll be satisfied as long as we’re not run out of town on a rail or tarred and feathered,” Casey said, chuckling. “Now get out of here and forget about the Bulletin . There’s nothing King or any other editor can do to us that we can’t handle via my weekly.”
    “Except that you have to wait until Sunday to rebut.”
    “All the more time to plan an impressive response,” Casey said. He arched a brow and eyed the newspaper his ally had brought in. “How much of that article is true, anyway?”
    “All of it,” Bein replied with a snide smile. “Why?”
     
    The pile of books the doctor had delivered to Sara Beth weighed more than all her brothers put together. She had asked him to leave them in the parlor where she could choose one at a time rather than take them to the girls’ ward and worry about the children being overly curious. Some of the illustrations had made her blush, but she kept reading, fascinated by her studies. The more she read, the more eager she was to learn, and the more she appreciated and revered her teacher.
    When she saw Taylor Hayward the