Merline Lovelace (23 page)

“M
ary!”

Victoria rapped on the rickety door hanging haphazardly from one hinge. The cotton scarf covering her tangled hair slipped down. Excitement shivered up and down her spine.

“Mary, it’s me. Let me in.”

She was tired, dirty and so hungry her stomach had long since given up hope of food, but finally—finally!—the end of this awful ordeal was in sight.

When the door opened, she slipped inside. The interior of the small house within smelling distance of one of Key West’s turtle canneries stank of wood rot and chicken droppings, yet Victoria barely noticed the odor.

“The telegraph lines are back up!” she exclaimed to the hollow-eyed woman inside. “I put a cable through to Sam in Santiago, and one to my papa. As soon as Papa wires back authorization to
draw funds on his account, I’ll go to the bank. I’ll buy us clean dresses, Mary. Whatever clean dresses are to be had on the island. And food. Real food.”

Carried away by her enthusiasm, she hooked her arms around Mary’s emaciated waist and danced her in a little circle.

“We’ll get sugar cakes, if there are any. Thick, juicy beef steaks. And cucumbers to take those shadows from under your eyes.”

“Stop! You’ll make me dizzy.”

Victoria almost stumbled over her own feet. She could hear the echo of those same words, tossed out laughingly on a snowy February night. Could almost see the yearning in Sam’s face as he’d caught this woman in his arms and swung her off her feet.

Dear God, what tortuous roads they’d all traveled since that night!

Grinning, she dropped her arms and tossed aside the scrap of cloth she’d used to cover her hair when she went into town. Although she’d washed away most of the salt and brine with rainwater, she hadn’t had the time or the energy to drag a comb through its wild tangles and pin it up.

“I’ll be glad to get out of these rags, I can assure you.”

An answering smile lit Mary’s face. It was weak and wobbly, but a real smile. She’d managed several since her fever had finally broken yesterday.

“
I’ll
be glad to get out of this chicken coop.”

Her nose wrinkling, Victoria glanced around the deserted dwelling that had housed them since they’d dragged themselves out of the churning surf and howling winds. It was hardly more than a shed tucked amid the coconut palms, only yards from the beach where the
Sea Cloud
’s longboat had nearly foundered setting them ashore. She couldn’t imagine how this ramshackle building had survived the fury that had destroyed so many others in Key West. But it had.

So had she and Mary. Against all odds. Against every probability.

Victoria suspected she would shudder every time she recalled the terror of that boat ride from the
Sea Cloud
to shore. Knew she’d suffer nightmares whenever she thought of the days that had followed, when she’d left Mary hidden while she begged, borrowed and traded the meager contents of her valise.

Fear of disease, she’d discovered, increased exponentially after a disaster of this magnitude. The few times she’d ventured out after the storm, the talk in the streets was all of extreme measures to protect against typhoid. Diphtheria. Cholera. She hadn’t dared bring Mary out of hiding until her fever broke. Couldn’t risk questions about where they’d come from, or how they’d arrived in Key West.

Disaster relief agencies had provided food and
water. Victoria’s few remaining dollars had purchased quinine for Mary. Sam’s service revolver had provided protection against the scavengers who crept out at night to pick the bones of the dead.

And just this morning, her gold locket had paid for two telegrams!

“We’ll hear from Sam tomorrow,” she predicted confidently. “My papa, too. I’ll go down to the cable office first thing. In the meantime, I think we should—”

“Quiet!”

Mary cocked her head, her sallow face a blur in the light filtering through the boards.

“I hear something. Or someone.”

Victoria’s breath hissed out. “Get away from the door.”

Her heart hammering, she dived for her valise. Mud, rain and surf had eaten away at the tapestry and rotted its leather handles. Inside, her notebooks had dried thick and almost indecipherable. But she’d meticulously cleaned Sam’s revolver and could now hold it steady.

She’d had plenty of practice these past nights. As she’d learned during her brief forays into town, Key West’s mayor had appealed to the naval base commander to declare martial law. With no streetlamps, no electric lights, no access or egress through debris-strewn streets, the dregs of humanity who al
ways preyed on the weak had taken to looting. And worse.

Her hands closed around the wood-grained grip of Sam’s revolver. It felt smooth. Cool. Lethal.

She’d have to accommodate for the pistol’s kick, Victoria reminded herself grimly. It wouldn’t produce the same punch as a buffalo hunter’s high-powered rifle, but she was damned if she’d end up on her backside in the dirt. Not this time. Not when she and Mary were so close to—

“Victoria!”

The hoarse shout came through the boards.

“Victoria, are you in there?”

She threw a disbelieving glance at Mary. The pistol dropped to the dirt. Leaping for the door, she wrenched it open.

“Sam!”

With a cry of joy, she threw herself into his arms. He gathered her against him in a bone-breaking embrace. Held her mashed against his chest. Shoved her away.

“I thought you were dead.”

His fingers gouged into her arms. His eyes blazed a path from her tangled hair to her soiled skirts and back again.

“They told me you’d gone down with the
Sea Cloud.
I thought you were dead.”

Before she could say a word, he dragged her against him again and buried his face in her hair.
She felt a shudder travel down his length, heard his ragged, in-drawn breath.

Eyes closed, Victoria sagged against him. After all these days and nights, she wanted nothing so much as to sink into his strength, lose herself in his embrace. Just the feel of his hard chest under her cheek broke the dam of her emotions and she started to cry. Not polite, delicate sniffs, but great, gulping sobs.

“Victoria. Sweetheart.” His brutal hold gentled. Remorse flooded his voice. “Don’t cry. It’s over. It’s all over.”

Sobs racked her. Her hands clutched at his shirt. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“How…? How did you find me?”

“I went to the cable office and saw the telegraph operator wearing your locket. She told me she’d taken it in payment for the cables you’d sent. I went through hell tracing your path from the telegraph office to here.”

His gaze swept the ramshackle shed, hardened, came back to her.

“I swear, I’ll never put you on a ship alone again. Wherever we go, we go together. Whatever disasters we face, we face together.”

“And joys, Sam.” She smiled through her tears. She could tell him about the baby now. Or she would, as soon as her head stopped spinning. “We’ll share the joys as well as the sorrows.”

She sagged against him again, safe, sure, home from both war and the sea. A heartbeat later, she tipped back her head.

“Mary’s here. Inside. Her fever broke yesterday. She’s still weak, but slowly getting back her strength.”

Sam nodded and held her. Just held her. He’d see to Mary in a moment. For now, he couldn’t seem to bring himself to let Victoria go.

Washington D.C.
February 2, 1901

A
cold, damp wind knifed down Pennsylvania Avenue and tugged at the coat skirts of the toddler Sam carried in his arms. Squealing at the wind’s bite, she buried her face in the beaver-trimmed collar of his overcoat.

“Hold on, sweet. We’ll be inside in a moment.”

Angling his shoulder to cut off the wind, Sam snuggled her closer against him while he waited for a uniformed marine to assist Victoria from the carriage. She gave the sergeant a gloved hand and descended. Her cheeks were pink from the cold, her blue eyes alive with excitement.

“I can’t believe we’re here,” she murmured in awe as Sam slipped his free hand under her elbow and escorted her up the carpeted steps. “At the
White House! Invited to witness a bill being signed into law.”

“Not just witness.” He grinned down at her. “You’ve got work to do, remember? I expect your coverage of this event will hit not just the front page of the
Tribune,
but most of the AP papers.”

“I expect it will,” Victoria answered smugly. After the wildly popular series of stories she’d penned following her return from Cuba, her byline now appeared with regular frequency in newspapers across the country.

Still, to be invited to the White House! By the vice president-elect, no less.

“Oh, how I wish Mary could be here!”

The toddler snuggled against Sam’s shoulder lifted her head. “Me, Mama?”

“No, darling, not you. Your aunt Mary.”

How strange life was at times, Victoria mused as another marine opened the tall doors at the top of the steps. Here she was in Washington, about to witness the signing of a bill recognizing the service of army nurses in the Spanish-American War, and Mary was back in Cuba, working with Dr. Walter Reed and his Yellow Fever Commission. General Leonard Wood was still there, too, as governor-general of Cuba. His surgeon’s training and single-minded determination to conquer yellow fever had provided the impetus for the army commission.

For a moment, the glittering lights that spilled
from the massive chandelier in the entrance foyer faded. Victoria could almost see a ring of jungle-covered mountains. The tall, rustling palms. The long rows of tents that constituted Camp Lazear, named for one of the commission members who’d died during the early phases of the study. After almost a year of intensive study, the commission still hadn’t pinpointed either the cause or a cure for the dreaded Yellow Jack. But they would. This time they would! According to Mary’s last letter, Dr. Reed was beginning to suspect that mosquitoes, not infected sheets or clothing from other patients, transmitted the disease. Now he just had to prove it.

“Garrett!”

The hearty bellow turned every head in the foyer.

“There you are, man!”

The vice president-elect strode down the hallway. In his frock coat and high starched collar, Theodore Roosevelt looked far more like a sleek politician than the scruffy, sunburned colonel Victoria remembered. Wisely, President McKinley had ridden the wave of Roosevelt’s huge popularity after the war and named the Rough Rider as his running mate for his second term. She couldn’t think of a better man for the job.

He pumped Sam’s hand, chucked the wide-eyed two-year-old under her chin and bussed Victoria heartily on her cheek.

“Quite a day, by jingo! I’m glad to see it, I can tell you that. It’s long past time this country recognized the contribution of our army nurses. A point you’ve stressed repeatedly in your articles, Mrs. Garrett.”

“Their service speaks for itself, sir. I merely added a few adjectives.”

“And very eloquently, if I may say so. Come into the Red Room. Mrs. Roosevelt is there, with Mrs. McKinley. You can shed your coats and warm up with a cup of hot tea.”

Tucking her arm in his, he led her through the public rooms of the house he already had aspirations of moving into in the not-too-distant future.

“We’ve a few minutes before the formal ceremony.” His eyes twinkled behind his thick spectacles. “You won’t need Sam to wrangle you a special pass from General Shafter to get you into this one.”

Victoria threw a laughing glance over her shoulder at her husband. “If I did, I don’t have a doubt in the world he could secure it.”

“Neither do I,” Roosevelt boomed. “Neither do I. He was a Rough Rider, after all.”

A half hour later, an aide escorted Victoria and Sam to the chairs lined up in front of the desk President McKinley used for ceremonial signings.
Mary, bless her heart, didn’t make a fuss. She rarely did when her father held her.

Victoria pulled a notebook and pencil from her string purse. Her mind was already cataloging the gold fringe on the curtains, the apple-green carpeting, the proud, shining faces of the nurses who stood in a semicircle behind the president. She recognized one from Siboney, a tall, spare woman who, like Victoria herself, had plopped down in a creek fully clothed to wash away the sweat and gore.

For once, she couldn’t make her pencil move. To be a part of this momentous occasion was so overwhelming, so humbling. Laying the pencil flat on her notebook, Victoria groped for Sam’s hand.

His fingers locked around hers. When he glanced at her, the smile in his eyes tightened her throat. They’d survived a war. Created a child. Braved tropical diseases and hurricanes. Together. Whatever else came, whatever monumental events happened in this new century, they’d meet them together.

With a sigh of pure happiness, Victoria gripped Sam’s hand and watched the president’s pen scratch across the bill authorizing the United States Army Nurse Corps.

D
ear Reader,

I’ve been wanting to write a story featuring the women who served during the Spanish-American War since I saw a picture of nurses taken aboard the hospital ship,
Relief,
in 1898. That photo captured my imagination and wouldn’t let go. Although I have no medical background myself, I became fascinated by their story.

Did you know that more than 1,500 American nurses volunteered to serve with the military during the Spanish-American War? Many worked in state-side hospitals. Hundreds shipped to Cuba and Puerto Rico and the Philippines. All labored under the most difficult conditions imaginable. Their courage and dedication led to the founding of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps in 1901, and U.S. Navy Nurse Corps in 1908.

During my research I also became absorbed by
the fact that this was truly a “correspondent’s war.” Men like Richard Harding Davis, artist Frederick Remington and novelist Stephen Crane didn’t just record events, they plunged right into them. Warring publishers like William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer were also right in the thick of things—Hearst even made a few dashes down to Cuba himself.

While Sam and Victoria and Mary are completely fictional, I had fun weaving their exploits in with those of real people like Teddy Roosevelt, Richard Davis and, of course, the indomitable Clara Barton. I hope you enjoyed this excursion into the past as much as I did!

Sincerely
Merline Lovelace