The pounding in Rob’s head woke him from a dazed sleep. The sensation of his naked skin rubbing against a scratchy wool blanket kept him from nodding back off.

“What the hell?” he mumbled to nobody in particular, though a woman with golden hair dangling from beneath a head covering was quick to answer.

“You’re safe,” she said. “You’re in our home.”

Rob tried to sit up in the tiny bed he had no memory of getting into. “Ow-wow-ow,” he said, his head popping like a string of firecrackers. Rob rubbed the back of his aching skull, and though it hurt, there was no blood or dizziness. “Ouch. What happened?”

“We’re not wholly certain.” The woman leaned over to shift Rob’s head back onto the lumpy pillow. Although her head covering was pinned tight beneath her chin, Rob still got a peek at what it hid: a mass of scar tissue that pulled the right side of her face taught.

“My friends found you on the road, stripped of everything but your skin and teeth. I’m afraid you’ve been robbed. Hopefully you weren’t carrying anything too valuable?”

Rob’s hands shot up to his face. “My glasses,” he moaned, noticing that everything beyond the blonde, scarred woman looked blurry as hell. “Damn it!”

“Please, sir!” she said. “Your language. We have a child.”

“Golda,” mumbled a small, yawning child who climbed into the woman’s lap. “Why is the strange naked man still in my bed?”

The woman stroked his spiky, little-boy hair. “He’s sick, Baby. He’s not well enough to get up.”

“When will he get up?” Baby asked.

“As soon as the new doctor arrives,” Golda said. “Papa and Mama have gone to fetch him.”

Papa. Mama. Baby. And Golda? Rob might not know where he’d woken up, but at least he knew which story he’d blundered into.

“I appreciate you sending for the new doctor,” Rob said. “But I don’t think there’s much chance of him arriving when he’s already here. You see, I’m Dr. Robert Henry Lang. Your name is Golda?”

“Well,” Golda said. She appeared flustered, but only for a moment. “This is a surprise. What can we do for you, doctor?”

Rob lifted the covers to confirm that he was, indeed, completely naked. “Later, I’ll need some help finding my way back to town. But first, do you have any clothes I could borrow?”

Predictably, nothing fit. The tunic was too large, the undershirt too small, and the thin leather shoes didn’t make up for Rob’s stolen clothes and glasses.

Golda sighed. “They’re not quite right, I know, but we’ll get you home soon. Rest, now. I’ll make some breakfast.”

Rob nodded, hiking up the large tunic as if it were a dress to sit on a tiny wooden stool, which promptly broke. Rob tumbled to the floor, and the crashing sound brought the young boy running.

“My stool!” he cried. “The strange naked man broke my stool!”

“Baby, it’s all right,” Golda said. “Papa will fix it for you. And it wouldn’t break if you weren’t jumping on it all the time.”

“That wasn’t me,” he said, holding his hand over his left ear. “I think it was Mama who jumped on it.”

“Oh, Baby, you know Mama wouldn’t jump on your stool.”

Rob picked up the broken pieces. He tried to jam the broken leg back into its hole, it wouldn’t stand up under its own weight, let alone anybody else’s.

“I’m sorry,” Rob said. “I’ve caused you no end of trouble today.”

Golda smiled. “You’ve caused some excitement, too, which is always welcome. We don’t see many people, living so far from town. Baby, I think I heard Papa and Mama outside. Why don’t you go help them in the barn?”

“No-o,” the boy said, snuggling into Golda’s skirt even as he continued to clutch his ear.

Rob’s ENT radar pinged through his still-throbbing head. “Hey, little fella,” he said, rolling up his voluminous sleeves. “Does your ear hurt? Like, inside hurt?”

The boy buried his face in Golda’s skirt, but she nodded yes. “He has pain in his ear every few months. Sometimes it’s both ears, and when that happens he can hardly sleep.”

“Do you mind if I take a look?”

“You . . . really are the new doctor?” she asked.

Rob laughed, which brought on a new wave of pain. He did note with some relief that the pain continued to localize on the bump, which ruled out an extensive head injury.

“I didn’t mean—” Golda began.

“It’s all right,” Rob said. “I’ve heard it before, trust me.”

Still, Golda hesitated. “You don’t have tools, or charts, or anything.”

“I won’t need them.” Rob settled cross-legged on the dirt floor, tucking a yard or two of tunic under his knees. “Don’t be afraid, buddy. I promise not to touch.”

From his days as an ear, nose and throat resident, Rob could spot an ear infection from a mile away. He’d put hundreds of tiny ear tubes in kids that helped drain away the fluid buildup Rob suspected was causing this boy so much pain.

However, that had been years ago, and even if the procedure had been fresher in his mind, there was no way he was sticking anything in that boy’s ears that wasn’t sterile, surgical-grade, or both.

“It’s okay, Baby,” Golda said. “Let the man look in your ear.”

“No-o,” he moaned, looking afraid.

“Why don’t you sit him right on your lap,” Rob said. “Turn him, so his left ear faces . . . yes, that’s better light.”

Despite the morning sun, Rob couldn’t see much. The outer ear looked red, but that was probably from rubbing instead of infection. “Any problem with balance? Dizziness?”

“He hasn’t mentioned it, but he seems less confident when climbing stairs or over the fence.”

Rob stuck his nose next to each ear. The left ear smelled a little sour, but he’d smelled much worse, especially with kids. What Rob really needed was a tuning fork for his next test. He’d ask Hans to have one made for him when he got back to town.

“Hey, buddy, I want to try a little game,” Rob said. Although a tuning fork would have produced a far more even tone, he could use his voice to conduct a basic hearing test. “I’m going to whisper a word into each of your ears. You tell me which sounds louder. Okay?”

The boy wiggled a bit in Golda’s lap. “Okay.”

“You’re doing great. Now listen carefully. Red,” he whispered into the boy’s left ear.

“Blue,” he whispered into the right, matching volumes as best he could. “Okay. Which one sounded louder?”

“Blue,” the boy said without hesitation.

“That’s it, we’re all done.” Rob slid back on the floor to assure his young patient that there would be no surprise pokes or prods. “Your boy has some fluid build-up behind the left eardrum due to a probable infection, and that’s causing the discomfort. The best thing we can do is drain as much of that fluid as we can, but we don’t want to stick anything in his ear. Nothing in his ear, okay?”

“Of course,” Golda agreed.

“Maybe twice a day, before bed and after breakfast, wrap the ear with a cloth soaked in hot water. Not too hot. It shouldn’t burn, but we want it warm. Keep the wrapped ear pointed down, toward the ground, or into a pillow, even. The heat should help loosen the fluid. After about 15-20 minutes, remove the cloth and see if you can get some fluid out by having him clear his ears. Can he do that yet?”

Golda scrunched her forehead, and Rob saw again how the right side of her face was more rigid than her left. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“You know, when you swallow or blow your nose, your ears ‘pop’ a little.”

“He can blow his own nose.”

“I can blow my own nose,” the boy echoed.

“Then he should be fine,” Rob said. “These things usually clear up on their own, but since he’s had a string of ear infections, we need to stay on top of them so he doesn’t lose any hearing.”

“Very well,” Golda said. “Baby, go find Papa and Mama and tell them our guest is awake.”

Once the boy had flown out the cottage door, Golda turned back to Rob. “No blood letting?”

Rob shook his head. “It’s really not my thing.”

Golda looked relieved. “Thank you, doctor. Tell me, what’s your fee?”

Rob climbed stiffly to his feet. “Between the clothes and the broken stool, I think I’m in your debt. Let’s call it even.”

“You’ll stay to eat with us, then,” she said. “Papa and Mama, the two bachelors who built this cottage, will want to thank you for your assistance with Baby.”

“Two bachelors?” Rob said, trying to remember who came out on top in this particular fairy tale, the girl or the bears. “I assumed . . . I mean, Mama and Papa are . . . no, you’re the boy’s mother, I can see that clearly. Are these men family?”

Golda flicked her eyes to the door. “Not as such, no.”

“Wait, are they keeping you here against your will? Did they,” Rob said, touching the side of his face that mirrored Golda’s injury. “Did they do this to you?”

Golda’s shoulders, which had been creeping upward, lost their tension as she let loose with a chuckle. “Heavens, no! Quite the opposite, in fact.”

“I’m not trying to pry,” Rob said. “I just see too much of that kind of thing, and I want to make sure you’re okay.”

“I believe you, doctor. Just between us, then?” Golda opened the cottage door, watching outside while she began her story. “I got into trouble with a boy years ago. When my parents discovered I was pregnant, I had to leave home. I knew the woods well enough, as they were my playground as a child, so I sought refuge there. I survived, more or less, until one night, I unknowingly took shelter in a bear’s den.

“Mercifully, I don’t recall much of the attack,” she continued. “But these two kind men rescued me and nursed me back to health, caring not a whit that I was pregnant. In fact, they were delighted, perhaps because they couldn’t have children themselves, and they adopted Baby and me into their household. Now my son has three loving parents, and I have the scars to remind me of the mistakes of my youth.”

Rob paused a moment to make sure her story had finished. “Your scars,” he said. “Do they give you much trouble? Pain, I mean? Maybe I could—”

“I know you want to help, doctor. But you can’t give me back my ear. My smooth skin. A chance at a decent marriage with a man who might look upon me with desire.”

“Your scars aren’t that bad. Are you sure one of these fellows wouldn’t marry you?”

“I may have thought so at first,” Golda said, waving outside to persons Rob couldn’t yet see. “I may have even hoped. But as kind as these men are, and as good and proper as they’ve been with my son, this pair has no interest in girls, scarred or otherwise.”

“None?” Rob said, as the lightbulb in his brain slowly lit up. “Oh. Okay. Bears. Got it.”

“Golda!” Baby shouted, bursting full-tilt into the cottage. “Mama and Papa brought eggs and honey for breakfast! I told them the strange naked man was awake.”

Papa and Mama entered the cottage carrying a basket between them. One of the men was huge, with giant paws for hands and a bushy beard that fell down his broad chest. His partner, though also bearded, was smaller, with softer features and a thinner frame.

Neither spoke a greeting, instead staring at Rob with intense, dark eyes. And though it was warm outside, both wore skullcaps and short cloaks lined with bear fur.