Ashes in the Wind (14 page)

“I’d jes’ as soon keep busy, thank ye.” Her rejection was curt.

“Suit yourself.” Major Magruder smiled thoughtfully and gazed in the direction of the dayroom. “The captain tried the same thing after receiving word that his father died, but he drove himself too far. Who knows but what it might have cost a life?”

He strode off before Alaina could give hot retort, and perhaps it was just as well there were no privies close about.

Al was unusually quiet the rest of the day. The bed in ward 5 was soon filled with another Union soldier. Somehow she could not bring herself to look in. Instead, she chose to tidy the officer’s dayroom, a much-neglected place since most of the doctors were far too busy to utilize it. She had not seen Captain Latimer since he left the ward in such a rush, and the other doctors, living as close to death as they did, did not press the lad.

Without knowledge of her secret, however, their reasoning was slightly astray. Alaina’s confusion ran far deeper than any of them guessed. She had a natural dislike of Northerners which had been focused by the war to a deep hatred. Now she knew her enemies by name and by face. They were no longer anonymous bluejackets, bright with braid and shiny buttons; they were men and boys, smiling and sad, happy or angry, laughing, joking, hurting, crying, dying, just the same as the friends she had waved good-bye to, just the same as her own beloved father and brothers. Human and with bodies that proved so terribly frail when pelted by fragments of metal. She had to rummage deep to find the memory of her hatred and deeper still to feel its stirring as of old.

Distractedly Alaina rubbed an oiled rag along the arm of a chair, trying to sort out her own feelings. She could offer no solace to the mother or wife of Bobby Johnson, but fervently hoped that someone, somewhere, had laid a kind hand on the breasts of her father and brother in their last moments. She felt the start of tears in her eyes, but sniffed them away as she heard footsteps in the hall. A young private
passed the doorway, then halted and came back to peer in.

“There you are, Al. Doctor Brooks wants to see you in his office when you finish work.”

Before she could question him, the orderly was gone. Alaina gave a last quick dusting to the chair and packed her rags, mops, and buckets away. It was nearly quitting time anyway, and she might as well see what the doctor wanted. It was the first time he had ever summoned her.

The climb to the third floor was less tiresome now that the weather had cooled. Trying to gain some respite from her feeling of disloyalty, she paused a moment to banter with the soldiers in the Confederate ward, then sauntered on down the hall toward Doctor Brooks’s small office. The door was open, and she managed an urchin’s grin as she entered. The elderly man hastily rose from his chair and came across the room to meet her.

“Didja want somep’n, doc?” she asked in her rough, boyish vernacular.

He did not speak but passed behind her. Alaina heard the door close and raised an eyebrow at the click of the latch. Turning, he came back and, taking her arm, led her to a chair.

“Forget that kind of speech for now, Alaina. We’re alone, and no one can hear. Here, child, have a seat.”

Alaina complied, then watched in great confusion as the man puttered about his office. Several times he opened his mouth to speak but failed and grew angrier with each attempt. Finally he came forward, snatched a thick volume of papers from his desk, and thrust them at her. His manner was now apologetic.

“We receive these each week, Alaina. The armies exchange them by special messenger.”

Somewhat at a loss, Alaina lowered her eyes and began to read.

Confederate States of America
Compiled by:
Headquarter’s Staff
General Lee’s Army of Virginia
Subject: Casualty Report

A. Complete listing of:
1. Wounded
2. Killed
3. Missing in action
4. Deserters.

Note: This section for the Union occupied areas of
Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.

A cold, tight feeling began to form in the pit of Alaina’s stomach. She had only one brother left! Jason! And she had seen these same reports twice before. With fearful slowness, Alaina raised her gaze until she met Doctor Brooks’s worried frown. She clenched her jaw tightly to keep it from trembling, then hastily flipped through the alphabetical listing until she came to the M’s. Her finger traced down the left hand column until she saw what she dreaded.

MACGAREN, JASON R., CAPTAIN. MISSING IN ACTION, PRESUMED DEAD. OCTOBER 4, 1863.

The rest blurred before her eyes. October the fourth! More than a month ago! Jason! Jason! Eldest child Jason! Tall, strong Jason! Beloved older brother
Jason! She remembered the time when Gavin, the younger brother by three years, had put burrs under her saddle; it was Jason who had snatched her from the bucking horse. Jason! Her hero! Poor, dead Jason!

“Alaina! Alaina!” The words broke into her trauma. She realized the doctor was rubbing her hands between his own. “Are you all right, child? You are so pale!”

Wearily Alaina nodded, wondering vaguely why no tears came. She braced back in the chair, withdrawing her hand and, as if it had become something vile and tainted, pushed the volume from her lap. It fell to the floor unheeded. Her lips curled back, her nose wrinkled as if some odorous stench invaded her nostrils.

“Alaina, have hope!” Doctor Brooks commanded. “It just indicates that he’s missing, not dead. Have hope, child.”

“It’s the same!” Alaina half snarled, half sobbed. “It’s just the same as before. First, it’s missing, then later a letter saying his body is buried somewhere and he’s officially dead.”

Doctor Brooks could not deny it. He had seen too many of these reports. They were usually made before the heat of battle cooled and rarely were all the dead accounted for. He could only shake his head sorrowfully and try to comfort her, but the sobs were coming, dry and racking.

“He didn’t—really want—to leave us. It was just—the thing to do—All the men went.” Alaina tipped her head back, and the tears streamed down her face in a sudden rush. She cried out in agony as the pain of it hit her full force.

“Aaarrrgh! Damn the war! Damn the fighting! Damn the killing! When will it end? Oh, Jason! Jason!” Her head fell forward, and Alaina covered her face with her hands, sobbing freely. Doctor Brooks pressed a soft cloth into her grasp and gently patted her shoulder, wiping his own cheek with the back of his hand.

“In God’s good time, Alaina,” he murmured softly, “when men have played out their foolish charades and grown sick with the slaughter, then it will end. He gives us free choice and full rein on our lives, and we do with it what we will. I beg of you, my child, don’t blame God for man’s folly.”

Alaina leaned her head against the comforting shoulder and let her anguish flow. Doctor Brooks raised her gently from the chair and half led, half carried her to a small couch. He pressed her down upon it and sat beside her, resting a hand on her shoulder, while she wept out her grief. When her trembling finally subsided, she fell into an exhausted slumber.

The windows were dark and the hour late when Alaina opened her eyes again. Doctor Brooks rose from his desk and came to her side.

“Are you ready to go home now, child?”

Alaina rubbed her puffy, reddened eyes and nodded wearily.

“I’ll have my carriage hitched and brought around for you.”

“No!” Her reply was sudden. “No thank you, Doctor Brooks. I have Ol’ Tar. Besides”—she smiled tremulously at the old friend—“a ragamuffin lad has no place in a fine buggy.”

The doctor heaved a sigh. “As you wish, Alaina.” He studied her for a long moment before reaching out to take her hand. “You’re a rare one, Alaina MacGaren. Many young women could not have borne what you have, and surely not with such spirit.” He straightened. “However, even a lad can get into trouble this late at night.”

“I’ll be careful,” she reassured him quietly. She caught a glimpse of her reflection in a window and paused, seeing her eyes swollen and red. She glanced up at the doctor and ventured a timid question. “Is Captain Latimer still here?”

“No, Cole left early this afternoon,” he replied. “Magruder accused him of letting his grief for his father interfere with his good judgment. I think the major still smarts from the leg incident. This time he openly accused Cole of being careless with Bobby Johnson’s life.”

“But that’s not true!” Alaina declared. “It was Magruder!”

“I know that, of course. Magruder had to blame someone else, though, to be sure that he was not accused himself.” The doctor waved his hand with an angry flourish. “When I last spoke with Cole, he made mention that his plans were to go out and let propriety go to hell.”

A short time later, Alaina mounted Ol’ Tar and turned him toward the river. She had no wish to return to the Craighugh residence just yet. Uncle Angus and Aunt Leala had made plans to attend a political meeting this evening, and she had no desire to contend with Roberta’s sniping comments.
Instead, alone and lonely, she meandered along the water’s edge. The slow lapping of the water and the oily ripples of the Mississippi made it seem deceptively gentle. Yet it had the strength of the fall rains behind its current, and the river had been known to change its course overnight, ripping a new flow way where none had been before.

The rain had stopped some time ago, and a bright, three-quarter moon now hung high above the flitting clouds, shyly showing its face and sending a thousand tiny fragments of light shimmering across the molten surface of the river. Alaina forced her mind away from the morass that seethed with her own problems. She dismounted and sat on the bank, wrapping her arms around her knees and resting her chin upon her forearm as she stared at the silent black hulks of the distant Union ships. Rage and fury roiled within her anew. Bitter tears stung her eyes.

“Traitor!” She spat into the river. “You brought the Yankees to our door. Shameless hussy! Have you no honor? No loyalty?”

From the stygian depth no answer came, but through Alaina’s mind there flowed apace a long, marching column of blue and gray figures, each with some horrible disparity, as if the artist had not completed them, some missing arms, others legs, or sometimes an eye or half a face. Unfinished caricatures! Leftovers of the war! Halfmen! Or less! It was a nightmare, the essence of which she could find in any hospital, Union or Confederate.

Strangely, from the darkness of the river, a shadow took form. Alaina blinked until she recognized it as a large tree drifting toward her down the
river. As it came close to the bar, it struck the shallows, then rolled heavily in the current. Suddenly an arm flashed in the moonlight, and Alaina came to her feet, realizing this had nothing to do with imagination. There was sputtering and thrashing as a hapless man struggled for a fresh grip on his tumbling raft.

Quickly Alaina glanced about her. Very shortly the man would be moving well beyond her reach, and there would, then, be little she could do to save him. The log swirled in an eddy and started to roll, threatening to dump its passenger in the water again. The man flung an arm wide and gave out a weak call before his head went under. The words were lost to her, but the sound of the voice set her to action.

Snatching off her heavy cotton jacket, she ran along the spit of land to its farthest point and splashed into the water. She swam out, fighting the strong current that sought to drag her under as it swept the log and the man toward her. Taking a deep breath, she dove under the swirling liquid and felt the water thread through her fingers as she plunged deeper. The trunk passed over her, and she shot up, desperately clutching for the man. She broke the surface of the water beside him.

There was no time for amenities, or breath for them left in her lungs. She caught a handful of his hair and channeled all the strength she could muster into her strokes, pulling him with her, not fighting the current but riding with it. Her feet sank into the oozing mud of the bottom, yet still she supported the man’s head above water while she gasped precious air, then floated him into waist-deep water.
Her strength was nearly spent, and it was all she could do to tug him onto the bank. Another log lay on the edge of the river, and with dogged perseverance, she managed to drag him over it until his head hung down the other side.

A cough followed by a violent retching brought up the brackish water he had swallowed and assured her that life still resided in the limp body. She reached out a hand to lift the lolling head and stared agape. It was Cole Latimer! Her mind stumbled. She had saved a Yankee, blue as a jaybird and wearing nothing more than his long johns. Now a vision assailed her. One of Jason lying twisted and gazing forever sightless under this same dimly lit night sky. Her eyes misted, then sobbing and shivering with anguished frustration and the chill of her wet garments, Alaina collapsed to her knees beside him. She wept and cried and gnashed her teeth, but no easing came, only a dull persistent thought of what must be done. With an effort she regained her composure and wiped at her wet cheeks, brushing away the tears that mixed with the water dribbling from her short hair.

“You m-muleheaded, gator-bait Y-Yankee,” she croaked tearfully. “You s-sure picked a rotten c-cold night to go swimming.” She rolled him over until he sat braced against the log. He groaned and groggily dropped his head back against the waterlogged wood. A trickle of something dark and sticky to the touch began to course down his brow from his hair, and a quick search with her fingers found a large lump beneath his scalp. “Someone laid a g-good one on you, Yankee. ‘Pears to me you got yerself
stinkin’ drunk to boot, and in this neck o’ woods, that’s pure foolishness. I thought ya said you could take care of yerself.”

The problem now was what to do with him. She had lost the key to his apartment, and it was obvious he was without his. Besides, she could hardly parade a Union officer in his underwear through Jackson Square. No telling what the ramifications would be for them both if she did.

There appeared to be no alternative other than taking him to the Craighughs’. It was her uncle’s usual custom to remain at the political rally until a late hour, sometimes returning when dawn was almost upon them. If that were the case tonight, she might be successful in smuggling the doctor past Roberta. There would be some tall explaining to do in the morning, and Uncle Angus would be furious, but she would leave the matter of soothing him to Roberta, who was far more effective at it anyway.