Fire by Night (42 page)
“Then I promise I won’t talk about any of it.”
“Well, don’t be secretive. It will look as though you’re hiding something if you’re too close-mouthed.”
“I don’t know what you want from me,” Julia said, exasperated. “Maybe I should stay home.”
“Then the gossip will really fly! Just be yourself, Julia—your old self, the happy, good-natured Julia we all knew before the war. Remember when Caroline still lived with us? All the fun you used to have?”
Julia remembered James turning to her the night Fredericksburg was in flames and asking,
“Do you think anyone who experiences this can ever be the same?”
She wasn’t the same person she’d been before the war. She could never be that person again.
“It’s bad enough that poor Robert is so morose,” Mother continued. “But at least people understand that he was in prison. There’s a reason for it. If you love your cousin, you might try to be cheerful for his sake if not for ours.”
Julia forced the picture of James from her mind and replaced it with a different one. She was on board the ship at White House Landing, listening to Sister Irene’s soft voice in the darkness.
“If we obey His command to love others, our life will have meaning whether we’re at a tea party or on a hospital ship.”
“You’re right, Mother,” Julia said, forcing a smile. “This is a wonderful occasion, and I promise I’ll be the perfect daughter.”
The moment she arrived at Robert’s house, Julia pushed all of her disquieting thoughts aside and mingled with the other guests. She flirted and flattered and played the role of beautiful socialite perfectly, as if she had never seen a battlefield or watched men die in agony. Robert was home. She would celebrate this moment, forgetting the past, not worrying about her future. She circulated through the crowd, careful not to talk to any one person for very long, forestalling the inevitable questions about her year in Washington.
Then Julia spotted Nathaniel Greene across the room, leaning casually against a chair, a contented expression on his handsome face. The shadow of loss that had been trailing her slipped away as her long-held feelings for Nathaniel rekindled. He looked up and saw Julia watching him. And to her utter amazement, he excused himself from the conversation he was holding and hurried over to her side.
“Julia! I heard you were back. Welcome home.”
“Thank you. It’s good to be home.”
“It seems like ages since I’ve seen you,” he said, his eyes holding hers. “I’m still quite disappointed that we couldn’t have dinner together the last time I was in Washington City. My time was so short.”
“I enjoyed our carriage ride, Nathaniel. And I don’t recall missing dinner at all.”
“You’re kind. I hope you’ll let me make it up to you. Will you be staying in Philadelphia long?”
“I …Yes. That is …I won’t be returning toWashington City.” She felt her smile falter for the first time. Her father had taken her into his study two nights ago and made it clear that her nursing career was over. She’d had her own way for a year, he’d been indulgent, but now Julia would be expected to take courtship seriously, as she’d promised him she would. At age twenty, it was high time she was married and settled down. She wondered how Nathaniel would take this news, if he would think less of her for abandoning her nursing duties before the war ended.
“That’s wonderful news,” he said. “I’m glad you aren’t going back.” When he smiled broadly, she was astonished. “I’m wellknown for being blunt, Julia. I need to say what’s on my mind. Now that you’re back to stay, I fear there will be a long line of gentlemen waiting to court you. May I push my way to the front of it?”
She smiled in return, and for the first time that evening it was genuine. “Nothing would please me more, Nathaniel.”
Chancellorsville, Virginia
May 1863
The thunder of heavy guns shook the ground. Phoebe knelt beside the soldier and felt for his heartbeat the way that Dr. Mc-Grath had shown her. It pulsed weakly beneath her fingers. She was all out of army-issue tourniquets, so she tied a piece of torn-up bed sheet around the man’s leg, as tightly as she could, to stop the bleeding. She gave him a drink of water and some morphine for the pain.
“I’m real sorry, but you’ll have to wait in line for surgery,” she told him. “It might be a while. Can you stand it?” He could only moan in reply.
Phoebe looked up. The stretcher-bearers were hurrying toward her, bringing more casualties. “Hang on,” she told him. “Don’t give up hope.”
It was different being on this side of the war. It sounded just the same—the rumble of cannon, the rattle of gunfire, the bloodchilling Rebel scream. And the smoke and the moans and the heart-pounding rush of fear were all the same. But now Phoebe was stopping blood, not shedding it. She never wanted to kill a man again.
Phoebe and the other nurses and doctors had followed at the rear of General Hooker’s troops as they’d marched west from their winter quarters at Falmouth. They’d crossed the river a few miles upstream, then circled back to attack the Rebels on their side of the river. The battles had been fierce for the past few days, her own work unending. Yet for all the vicious fighting, she had just heard the upsetting news that the Union troops were pulling back, giving up in defeat. It was what they’d done when she’d fought on the Peninsula with Ted.
Phoebe braced herself as the orderlies ran toward her with another stretcher. Her old regiment was fighting out there, and some of these soldiers might be men she knew. She always scanned the wounded men’s faces, but she knew before they even got close that the man they were bringing to her was too tall to be Ted. His feet hung off the end of the stretcher.
“Set him down right here,” she said. “I’ll tend him.” She crouched beside the man and dipped her cloth into the bucket of water to wash his wounds. But when she saw his familiar face and wiry yellow hair, the shock was so great she lost her balance and toppled to one side, nearly upsetting the bucket.
“Willard!”
Panic and fear swept through Phoebe at the sight of her brother’s ashen face. She quickly scrambled to her knees and bent over him, gently slapping his cheeks and calling his name. “Willard …Willard, can you hear me? Come on, say something!”
He groaned and began to cough, bringing up blood. She felt for his pulse, her hands trembling, then looked him over and saw that he had a chest wound. His uniform jacket was drenched with blood.
God! Oh, God!
“Hang on, Willard,” she said, struggling to her feet. “I’ll be right back.”
The doctors were operating outside on a table made from a plank and four flour barrels. Phoebe stood back and waited anxiously, not daring to look as they finished amputating a man’s arm. Then she hurried over before they had a chance to call for another patient.
“Dr. McGrath, I need you to come!” she begged, tugging his sleeve. “It’s my brother Willard.”
“He’ll have to wait his turn,” one of the army doctors said. “No favoritism.”
James ignored the man. “Where is he, Phoebe? Show me.”
He followed her back to where Willard lay and knelt beside him, feeling for his pulse. When Dr. McGrath gently unbuttoned Willard’s jacket and shirt and peeled them back, Phoebe saw for herself how terrible his wound was. The hole beneath his breastbone was the size of a fist. His abdomen looked large and swollen. James pressed on it lightly, then let go, and Willard startled with pain.
“Help me roll him over a little,” James said. Willard cried out when they moved him. James lifted the back of Willard’s jacket to look, then laid him flat again. “Do you have any morphine?” he asked Phoebe.
She handed him a container of powder, and James sprinkled it into the wound. He stood, motioning for Phoebe to walk with him.
“I’m sorry, Phoebe. Whatever hit him went all the way through. There’s major damage to his liver, signs of peritonitis. I don’t know how he’s still alive.” He stopped walking and turned to face her, resting his hands on her shoulders. “I know how difficult it is when it’s your own family and there’s nothing you can do. … ”He looked away for a moment, then met her gaze again. “Are you going to be all right?”
She nodded. “I knew it wasn’t good. He was coughing blood. I just needed to make sure.” She sounded much braver than she felt.
“Give him as much morphine as he needs.” The doctor squeezed her shoulders, then hurried back to the operating table.
Phoebe sat down beside her brother again and carefully lifted his head into her lap. He was sweating and pale. She bathed his face and neck with water, calling his name. “Come on, Willard, don’t be ornery now. Wake up and say something. It’s me …your sister, Ike.”
He slowly opened his eyes. “Ike?”
“Yeah, you remember me, don’t you? The sister you left behind?” She tried to smile.
“ ’Course I do. But you ain’t supposed to be here. … Thought I was seeing things.”
“No, it’s really me. I’m a nurse, Will. I’m working for the army, just like you.”
He shook his head from side to side, his face angry. “Not supposed to be here. Supposed to be home with Miz Haggerty. Can’t you ever do what you’re told?”
“Not unless you and Junior sit on me and make me. Besides, the army pays me more than Mrs. Haggerty ever would of. They give me food and a place to stay, too.”
He closed his eyes, his anger gone. “Well, I guess that’s okay, then. You’re earning your keep.”
“Want some water?” She held the dipper to his lips and offered him another drink. He coughed most of it back up along with more blood. She wiped his face again. It was as white as flour. “You hear anything about Junior and Jack?” she asked.
“Jack got hit in the leg last year. Took him to some hospital. Junior’s okay.”
“I’ll be glad when this war ends and we can get our farm back from Jeb, won’t you? I hope he ain’t made a mess of it by now or worked those sorry horses of ours half to death. It’ll be nice being all together again, won’t it?”
Willard nodded. “You look different …wearing a dress. Remind me of Ma. … ” His breathing was becoming more ragged. He needed to gulp air between every few words. Phoebe knew he was slipping away, but she wanted to keep him talking, keep him with her for just a little longer.
“I can’t remember our ma at all, can you, Will?”
“She was pretty, like you. … Used to sit …on my bed …stroke my hair …like you’re doing …until I fell asleep. You have her name.”
“Her name was Phoebe?”
“Yeah. Didn’t you know?”
“Nobody ever told me. You all never talked about her much.”
“Pa took to calling you Ike …after she died.”
When he started to close his eyes, Phoebe said, “Hey, did you hear the news? They’re gonna make us a brand-new state next month. They say that the whole western part of Virginia decided not to rebel, so they’re making it into a new state. Bone Hollow is still in the Union. Ain’t that good news, Will? Maybe you or Junior can run for governor.”
“I’m not gonna make it, am I? That’s why they ain’t operating.”
“Sure you are. You got to wait your turn is all.”
“You’re lying, Ike. I always knew …when you was lying.”
“Am not.”
He groped for her hand and gripped it in his own. “Who’s gonna take care of you …if none of us …make it back?”
“I reckon I can take care of myself,” she said, biting her lip.
He smiled faintly. “Yeah, you always could. Don’t you know …a man likes to take care of a woman?”
The tears she’d been holding back finally started to fall as she thought of Ted. “No, Willard, I didn’t know that. Nobody ever told me.”
“Phoebe…?” he said weakly. “I’m sorry we ran off …and left you all alone.”
“That’s okay. I forgive you.”
But as her tears fell on his pale, still face, she didn’t know if her brother had heard her or not.
Julia stood alone in the vast exhibition hall and gazed at the tattered remnants of the Christian Commission’s fair. The crowds that had filled the building for the past three days had all gone home, the patriotic bunting drooped from the rafters, and a lone worker swept the littered floor with a broom. It was late. The fair was over. It was past time for Julia to go home. They’d collected tons of food and clothing for the comfort and relief of soldiers, and thousands of dollars in donations to purchase Bibles, religious tracts, and medical supplies for the Commission to distribute. She’d worked hard to make the fair a success, and it had filled the void in her life for the past month. But what would she do now that the fair was over?
“Julia?” Nathaniel’s voice echoed in the deserted hall. “Don’t tell me you’re still here? Do you need a ride home?” He jogged up the long aisle toward her, looking as fresh and buoyant as if it were morning, not late at night on the last day of the fair. She marveled at how Nathaniel’s “causes” always seemed to energize him, not deplete him.
“No, my coach is outside,” she said. “I was just leaving. Why are you still here?”
“We were counting the donations. You won’t believe it—more than twelve thousand dollars so far! What an enormous success!” Nathaniel was beaming. “And we owe it all to you, Julia.”