The Last, Long Night (#5 in the Bregdan Chronicles Historical Fiction Romance Series) (2 page)

Carrie and Janie turned to him with questioning looks.

“Both of you probably missed the news a couple weeks back about Dr. Mary Walker.”

“
Dr.
Walker?”  Carrie asked in disbelief.

“A
woman
?” Janie gasped.

“There is a small ward for women,” Dr. Wild explained, “but Dr. Walker is a rather unconventional woman.”  He smiled at Carrie.  “I think you would like her.”

Carrie smiled and waited for him to continue.

“Dr. Walker is one of the country’s first women doctors.  She graduated from Syracuse Medical College almost ten years ago.   Then she married a fellow student, but I understand the ceremony didn’t include a promise to obey; she didn’t take his name, and she wore trousers and a dress coat to her wedding.”

Carrie and Janie both laughed in disbelief.

“Neither the marriage nor their joint medical practice lasted long,” Dr. Wild said wryly.  “She is quite the champion of women’s rights and dress reform.”

Carrie grinned.  “You’re right; I believe I would like her very much!” 

“They captured her as a spy,” Dr. Wild continued, “though if my source is correct, she crossed our lines to treat civilians, not to spy.”

“But to be in Castle Thunder,” Janie said with a shudder.  “It’s such a horrible place.”

“I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy,” Carrie responded, unable to get the memories of her friend Matthew sick and gaunt after many months in Libby Prison from her mind.  She could only hope he had been able to make it all the way to Fort Monroe and gain the protection of the Union Army.

“I hope she’ll be released in a prisoner exchange quickly,” Dr. Wild agreed somberly.

Thoughts of Matthew had Carrie turn and stare east toward the coast, toward Fort Monroe.  Had Matthew made it?  Had he found Rose?  Was she still teaching at the contraband camp?  Even that tiny morsel of information about her former slave Rose, who was closer than any sister could be, had fed her starving heart when Carrie and Robert helped Matthew escape several weeks before. 

Janie, feeling her frustration, reached out to take her hand.  Carrie absorbed the courage it offered. 

Captain Robert Borden was weary to the bone.  Not from fighting, the battle had not yet started.  He was weary of the war and had lost all confidence in ultimate victory.  Before the first shot was fired, he knew the outcome would be the slaughter of thousands of men, with the distinct possibility he would be one of them. Whether they won or lost, this particular battle didn’t seem to really matter.

He settled back against the cunningly built earthworks that created a natural fortress the Union could not breach.  The sparkling waters of the Rapidan River, flowing placidly below the high hills of the southern bank, had become the unofficial boundary of the Union and the Confederacy.  The setting sun cast a golden glow that could almost make one believe there wasn’t really a war going on.

Robert closed his eyes and let Carrie enter his thoughts, though somehow it seemed wrong to bring her fresh beauty and vibrant energy onto the battlefield.  It was the only thing that kept him going.  He was no longer fighting to win a war.  He was fighting to protect his beautiful wife in the city the Union was determined to destroy. 

“Hey, Captain!” 

Robert opened his eyes and looked at the boy who had crawled over to him. His heart ached when he looked at the boy, barely sixteen, with his gaunt cheeks and exhausted, yet still defiant, eyes.  “Yes, Jimmy?”               

“You reckon the battle will start tomorrow?  The fellas are getting plenty tense.”

Robert shook his head.  “I don’t know, Jimmy.  I believe it will be soon, but we haven’t gotten any orders yet.” 

“You really think we got a chance against Meade’s army?  I hear we’re outnumbered pretty bad.”  Jimmy’s sober face was much too old for someone his age.

Regardless of what he really believed, Robert knew it was his job to send his men into battle with confidence.  “Of course, we’re going to beat them!  It’s not the first time we’ve sent a much bigger army running.  They don’t know what’s hit them when they run into us.”  He made his voice strong and reassuring and was rewarded when confidence replaced the fear on Jimmy’s face.

“Yeah.  We’re going to make them Yankees run like all the other times!”

Robert gazed at the boy.  “Where are you from, Jimmy?”

“My folks got a place down in Georgia, Captain Borden.  I ain’t never been no farther than a few miles from the farm until this war started.  I reckon I’ve seen more of this country than anyone else in my family,” he boasted. 

“What do you want to do when the war is over?”  Robert knew it would help Jimmy if he stayed focused on the future by having something to pull him forward through the hard times.

Jimmy shrugged, smiled slightly, and looked down for a moment before he raised his eyes.  “I want to go back and start my own livery.  I reckon I love horses more than anything.  I’ve always dreamed of having my own place.”

“There’s nothing like a good horse,” Robert agreed readily.

“Yeah.  Like that gray thoroughbred you ride!  I think that might just be the finest animal I’ve ever seen.  Where’d you get him?”

“Granite belongs to my wife,” Robert said, already wishing the beautiful horse was far from the battlefield, safe in his stall on Cromwell Plantation. 

“He’s really something!”

“That he is,” Robert said fervently.  He looked more closely at Jimmy’s shining eyes.  “Would you like to take care of him tonight?”  He was used to doing it himself, but he could tell the boy needed something to distract him.

“You bet!”

Robert was silent for a moment before he continued.  “Hey, Jimmy, if something happens to me, will you take care of Granite?  Make sure he gets back to Richmond?”  He hated to diminish the boy’s confidence, but he didn’t want Carrie to lose her husband
and
her horse.

Jimmy’s eyes widened as his shoulders straightened.  “Yes, sir!  I would consider it an honor, sir!”

Robert smiled.  “Thank you.  Now go join the men and have something to eat.”  He didn’t bother to acknowledge that the meager food the men had was far from sufficient.  The odd mixture of wheat bran and beef closely resembled glue when it was cooked, and it did little to satisfy the men’s hunger.

Hunger was as much a part of army life as fighting was.  Everyone knew that it wasn’t possible to get enough food to the army.   Only one railway line still operated, and it wasn’t enough to get food to the men, or fodder to the animals.  Robert spent time every day gathering fresh spring grass for Granite.  The horse was still thin, but he looked better than most of them did.  That, at least, he could do for Carrie.

Jimmy rose to leave but then turned back with one final question.  “Hey, Captain, are there are more men coming up to help us?”

Robert knew his men had been waiting for reinforcements, hoping for help.  He shook his head but didn’t want to go into the truth that the South was out of men – all the available men had been killed, wounded, or  had deserted.  “We’re not going to need them,” he said confidently.  “Lee has them off fighting in other areas because he knows his army can handle anything the Yankees throw at us!”

Jimmy gazed at him for a moment and then seemed to draw strength from what he saw in his captain’s eyes.  Once more he straightened his shoulders.  “You got that right!  We’re just going to send them Yanks running again!  One day they’ll get tired of losing, and they just won’t come back!”

Robert watched as Jimmy crawled back to his group, and then he went in search of Granite.  He closed his eyes again as the sun faded and darkness fell on the woods; he knew that even if it did not happen tomorrow, the battle would happen soon.

Carrie leaned back in the wagon seat and looked around at Richmond.  It never ceased to amaze her how much the city had changed - worsened - since the war had begun.  Gone was the genteel elegance.  Gone was the prosperity.  Gone was the confidence.

Richmond’s privilege of being the capital of the Confederacy brought the harsh reality of overcrowding, poverty, crime, prostitution, hunger, and the ever-present fear that Union troops would capture the city.

Carrie had learned to block most of it out by focusing on caring for her patients.  She had done everything she could do at Chimborazo.  Now she was on her way down to the hospital in the black part of town.

“I don’t reckon there will be any trouble today,” Hobbs said.  “With a  battle this close, I don’t think anyone will try to stop us.” 

Carrie shrugged as Janie nodded her head.  She had quit wondering what would happen and had decided she would deal with whatever
did
happen.

She knew Hobbs took his job seriously, though.  Only three years her junior, he seemed much younger. Hobbs had served under Robert until he almost lost his leg in the same battle that had almost taken Robert from her – that had him missing for nine months.  The boy remained fiercely loyal to
his
lieutenant.  Unable to fight anymore because of his wounded leg, he was now Carrie’s assistant at the hospital and helped provide security for her when she went into the most dangerous part of town to the black hospital. 

Carrie had grown to love the redheaded boy with intense, shining brown eyes and unfailing enthusiasm.  “I think you’re right, Hobbs.  I don’t think it will take us long to take care of the patients today unless more have come in since we were last there.”

Hobbs patted the rifle that sat across his lap.  “We’ll be fine, Miss Carrie,” he promised.  He knew of the times groups of men had tried to stop Carrie and Janie from going to the hospital, incensed that the “niggers” were getting help from white women. 

“I think the boy be right, Miss Carrie,” Spencer agreed.  “I ain’t got word of no trouble.”

Carrie smiled warmly at her driver.  Spencer was a free black that had been her driver for the last two years.  Their bond, forged by the challenges they had faced together, was strong.  “I’m not worried,” she said confidently and then leaned back to smile at Janie.   Both of them were content to ride in silence, letting the late afternoon air wash away the fatigue from the day.

Pastor Anthony was waiting for them at the door of the hospital.  The kindly man with warm blue eyes was such an important part of her life and had done so much for her, including opening the door for her to operate as the sole doctor for the black hospital.  She wished, though, that she could shake the disappointment she felt everytime she looked at him now. 
Not even Janie knew…

Carrie shook her head impatiently; now was not the time to think about it. She had work to do.  “Hello, Pastor Anthony,” she said, jumping from the carriage.  “How are our patients today?” 

Not waiting for an answer, she and Janie moved into the simple wooden building.  It was rustic and plain, but it was clean, and the patients had primitive wood slat beds that kept them off the ground.  It was a huge improvement from what she and Janie had found when they first arrived more than a year ago and discovered all the patients laying on the ground; coarse blankets their only bedding. . 

Carrie took comfort from knowing the back room held shelves of herbal medicines she had made while on the plantation and then had managed to smuggle into Richmond.  She had brought them to the black hospital because the people in this part of town had no way of getting to the woods to collect plants.  As long as they were careful, there would be enough to last through another summer and winter.

Carrie made her rounds of the beds and was glad to see most of them were empty.  Spring meant renewed activity at Chimborazo because of battles, but it also meant relief for the people in the black section of town that suffered so much from the bitter winter cold.  This hospital had not lost even one patient that winter, but Carrie knew serious illness could break out at any time. 

She smiled when she got to Johnny’s bed and knelt down to meet him at eye level.  “Hello, Johnny.”  She was glad to see that the six-year-old’s dark eyes, glistening with fever the last time she was there, were now clear.