"When we remember how they died--
In dark ravine and on the mountain-side,...
How their dear lives were spent
By lone lagoons and streams,
In the weary hospital tent,...
....it seems
Ignoble to be alive!"
--THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH.
The three nurses travelled southward by railway, steamboat, and wagon.
On the evening of the third day they came to the first hospital, having
been met at the river by an escort, and safely guided across a country
fair with summer and peaceful to the eye, but harassed by constant
skirmishing--the guerrilla warfare that desolated that border during the
entire war. The houses they passed looked home-like and quiet; if the
horses had been stolen and the barns pillaged, at least nothing of it
appeared in the warm sunshine of the still August day. At the door of
the hospital they were welcomed cordially, and within the hour they were
at work, Anne timidly, the others energetically. Mary Crane had the
worst cases; then followed Mrs. Barstow. To Anne was given what was
called the light work; none of her patients were in danger. The men here
had all been stricken down by fever; there were no wounded. During the
next day and evening, however, stories began to come to the little post,
brought by the country people, that a battle had been fought farther up
the valley toward the mountains, and that Hospital Number Two was filled
with wounded men, many of them lying on the hard floor because there
were not beds enough, unattended and suffering because there were no
nurses. Anne, who had worked ardently all day, chafing and rebelling in
spirit at the sight of suffering which could have been soothed by a few
of the common luxuries abundant in almost every house in Weston, felt
herself first awed, then chilled, by this picture of far worse agony
beyond, whose details were pitilessly painted in the plain rough words
of the country people. She went to the door and looked up the valley.
The river wound slowly along, broad, yellow, and shining; it came from
the mountains, but from where she stood she could see only round-topped
hills. While she was still wistfully gazing, a soldier on horseback rode
up to the door and dismounted; it was a messenger from Number Two,
urgently asking for help.
"Under the circumstances, I do not see how I can refuse," said the
surgeon of Number One, with some annoyance in his tone, "because none of
my men are wounded. People never stop to think that fever is equally
dangerous. I was just congratulating myself upon a little satisfactory
work. However, I shall have to yield, I suppose. I can not send you all;
but I ought to spare two, at least for some days. Mary Crane of course
can do the most good; and as Miss Douglas can not be left here alone,
perhaps it would be best that she should go with Mary."
"You retain Mrs. Barstow here?" asked Anne.
"Yes; I have, indeed, no choice. _You_ are too young to be retained
alone. I suppose you are willing? (Women always are wild for a change!)
Make ready, then; I shall send you forward to-night." The surgeon of
Number One was a cynic.
At nine o'clock they started. The crescent of a young moon showed itself
through the light clouds, which, low as mist, hung over the valley.
Nothing stirred; each leaf hung motionless from its branchlet as they
passed. Even the penetrating sing-song chant of the summer insects was
hushed, and the smooth river as they followed its windings made no
murmur. They were in a light wagon, with an escort of two mounted men.
"If you go beyond Number Two, you'll have to take to horseback, I
reckon," said their driver, a countryman, who, without partisan feeling
as to the two sides of the contest, held on with a tight grip to his
horses, and impartially "did teaming" for both.
"Is there still another hospital beyond?" inquired Anne.
"Yes, there's Peterson's, a sorter hospital; it's up in the mountains.
And heaps of sick fellers there too, the last time I was up."
"It does not belong to this department," said Mary Crane.
"I reckon they suffer pooty much the same, no matter where they belong,"
replied the driver, flicking the wheel reflectively with his whip-lash.
"There was a feller up at Number Two the other day as hadn't any face
left to speak of; yet he was alive, and quite peart."
Anne shuddered.
"There now, hold up, won't you?" said Mary Crane. "This young lady ain't
a real nurse, as I am, and such stories make her feel faint."
"If she ain't a real nurse, what made her come?" said the man, glancing
at Anne with dull curiosity.
"Twas just goodness, and the real downright article of patriotism, I
guess," said the hearty nurse, smiling.
"Oh no," said Anne; "I was lonely and sad, and glad to come."
"It _doos_ kinder rouse one up to see a lot of men hit in all sorts of
ways, legs and arms and everything flying round," remarked the driver,
as if approving Anne's selection of remedies for loneliness.
They reached Number Two at dawn, and found the wounded in rows upon the
floor of the barn dignified by the name of hospital. There had been no
attempt to classify them after the few beds were filled. One poor torn
fragment of humanity breathed his last as the nurses entered, another an
hour later. Mary Crane set herself to work with ready skill; Anne, after
going outside two or three times to let her tears flow unseen over the
sorrowful sights, was able to assist in taking care of two kinds of
cases--those who were the least hurt and those who were beyond hope, the
slightly wounded and the dying. One man, upon whose face was the gray
shadow of death, asked her in a whisper to write a letter for him. She
found paper and pen, and sat down beside the bed to receive his farewell
message to his wife and children. "And tell little Jim he must grow up
and be a comfort to his mother," he murmured; and then turning his quiet
gaze slowly upon the nurse: "His mother is only twenty-two years old
now, miss. I expect she'll feel bad, Mary will, when she hears." Poor
young wife! The simple country phraseology covered as much sorrow as the
finest language of the schools. During the night the man died.
The new nurses remained at Number Two six days. Anne's work consisted
principally in relieving Mary Crane at dawn, and keeping the watch
through the early morning hours while she slept; for the head surgeon
and Mary would not allow her to watch at night. The surgeon had two
assistants; with one of these silent old men (they were both
gray-haired) she kept watch while the sun rose slowly over the
hill-tops, while the birds twittered, and the yellow butterflies came
dancing through the open doors and windows, over the heads of the poor
human sleepers. But Number Two had greater ease now. The hopelessly
wounded were all at rest, their sufferings in this life over. Those who
were left, in time would see health again.
On the seventh day a note came to the surgeon in charge from the
temporary hospital at Peterson's Mill, asking for medicines. "If you can
possibly spare us one or two nurses for a few days, pray do so. In all
my experience I have never been so hard pushed as now," wrote the other
surgeon. "The men here are all down with the fever, and I and my
assistant are almost crazed with incessant night-work. If we could be
relieved for one night even, it would be God's charity."
The surgeon of Number Two read this note aloud to Anne as they stood by
a table eating their hasty breakfast. "It is like the note you sent to
us at Number One," she said.
"Oh no; that was different, _I_ never send and take away other people's
nurses," said Dr. Janes, laughingly.
"I should like to go," she said, after a moment.
"You should like to go? I thought you were so much interested here."
"So I am; but after what I have seen, I am haunted by the thought that
there may be worse suffering beyond. That is the reason I came here. But
the men here are more comfortable now, and those who were suffering
hopelessly have been relieved forever from earthly pain. If we are not
needed, some of us ought to go."
"But if we pass you on in this way from post to post, we shall get you
entirely over the mountains, and into the Department of the Potomac,
Miss Douglas. What you say is true enough, but at present I refuse. I
simply can not spare you two. If they should send us a nurse from
Rivertown as they promised, we might get along without you for a while;
but not now. Charity, you know, begins at home."
Anne sighed, but acquiesced. The surgeon knew best. But during that day,
not only did the promised nurse from the Rivertown Aid Society arrive,
but with her a volunteer assistant, a young girl, her face flushed with
exaltation and excitement over the opportunity afforded her to help and
comfort "our poor dear wounded heroes." The wounded heroes were not
poetical in appearance; they were simply a row of ordinary sick men,
bandaged in various ways, often irritable, sometimes profane; their
grammar was defective, and they cared more for tobacco than for texts,
or even poetical quotations. The young nurse would soon have her romance
rudely dispelled. But as there was good stuff in her, she would do
useful work yet, although shorn of many illusions. The other woman was a
professional nurse, whose services were paid for like those of Mary
Crane.
"_Now_ may we go?" said Anne, when the new nurse had been installed.
Dr. Janes, loath to consent, yet ashamed, as he said himself, of his own
greediness, made no long opposition, and the countryman with the
non-partisan horses was engaged to take them to Peterson's Mill. For
this part of the road no escort was required. They travelled in the
wagon for ten miles. Here the man stopped, took the harness from the
horses, replaced it with two side-saddles which he had brought with him,
drew the wagon into a ravine safely out of sight, effaced the trace of
the wheels, and then wiping his forehead after his exertions, announced
that he was ready. Anne had never been on horseback in her life. Mary
Crane, who would have mounted a camel imperturbably if it came into the
line of her business, climbed up sturdily by the aid of a stump, and
announced that she felt herself "quite solid." The horse seemed to agree
with her. Anne followed her example, and being without physical
nervousness, she soon became accustomed to the motion, and even began to
imagine how exhilarating it would be to ride rapidly over a broad plain,
feeling the wind on her face as she flew along. But the two old brown
horses had no idea of flying. They toiled patiently every day, and
sometimes at night as well, now for one army, now for the other; but
nothing could make them quicken their pace. In the present case they
were not asked to do it, since the road was but a bridle-path through
the ravines and over the hills which formed the flank of the mountains
they were approaching, and the driver was following them on foot. The
ascents grew steeper, the ravines deeper and wilder.
"I no longer see the mountains," said Anne.
"That's because you're in 'em," answered the driver.
At night-fall they reached their destination. It was a small mountain
mill, in a little green valley which nestled confidingly among the wild
peaks as though it was not afraid of their roughness. Within were the
fever patients, and the tired surgeon and his still more tired assistant
could hardly believe their good fortune when the two nurses appeared.
The assistant, a tall young medical student who had not yet finished
growing, made his own bed of hay and a coverlet so hungrily in a dusky
corner that Anne could not help smiling; the poor fellow was fairly
gaunt from loss of sleep, and had been obliged to walk up and down
during the whole of the previous night to keep himself awake. The
surgeon, who was older and more hardened, explained to Mary Crane the
condition of the men, and gave her careful directions for the night;
then he too disappeared. Anne and Mary moved about softly, and when
everything was ready, sat down on opposite sides of the room to keep the
vigil. If the men were restless, Mary was to attend to them; Anne was
the subordinate, merely obeying Mary's orders. The place was dimly
lighted by two candles set in bottles; the timbers above were festooned
with cobwebs whitened with meal, and the floor was covered with its fine
yellow dust. A large spider came slowly out from behind a beam near by,
and looked at Anne; at least she thought he did. He was mealy too, and
she fell to wondering whether he missed the noise of the wheel, and
whether he asked himself what all these men meant by coming in and lying
down in rows upon his floor to disturb his peacefulness. At sunrise the
surgeon came in, but he was obliged to shake the student roughly before
he could awaken him from his heavy slumber. It was not until the third
day that the poor youth lost the half-mad expression which had shone in
his haggard face when they arrived, and began to look as though he was
composed of something besides big jaws, gaunt cheeks, and sunken eyes,
which had seemed to be all there was of him besides bones when they
first came.
The fever patients at Peterson's Mill were not Western men, like the
inmates of Number One and Number Two; they belonged to two New York
regiments. Mary Crane did excellent work among them, her best; her
systematic watchfulness, untiring vigilance, and strict rules shook the
hold of the fever, and in many cases routed the dismal spectre, and
brought the victims triumphantly back to hope of health again.
One morning Anne, having written a letter for one of the men, was
fanning him as he lay in his corner; the doors were open, but the air
was sultry. The man was middle-aged and gaunt, his skin was yellow and
lifeless, his eyes sunken. Yet the surgeon pronounced him out of danger;
it was now merely a question of care, patience, and nourishment. The
poor mill-hospital had so little for its sick! But boxes from the North
were at last beginning to penetrate even these defiles; one had arrived
during the previous night, having been dragged on a rude sledge over
places where wheels could not go, by the non-partisan horses, which were
now on their patient way with a load of provisions to a detachment of
Confederates camped, or rather mired, in the southern part of the
county. The contents of that box had made the mill-hospital glad; the
yellow-faced skeleton whom Anne was fanning had tasted lemons at last,
and almost thought he was in heaven. Revived and more hopeful, he had
been talking to his nurse. "I should feel easier, miss, if I knew just
where our captain was. You see, there was a sort of a scrimmage, and
some of us got hurt. He wasn't hurt, but he was took down with the
fever, and so bad that we had to leave him behind at a farm-house. And
I've heard nothing since."
"Where was he left--far from here?"
"No; sing'lerly enough, 'twas the very next valley to this one. _We_
went in half a dozen directions after that, and tramped miles in the
mud, but he was left there. We put him in charge of a woman, who _said_
she'd take care of him, but I misdoubt her. She was a meaching-looking
creature."
"Probably, then, as you have heard nothing, he has recovered, and is
with his regiment again," said Anne, with the cheerful optimism which is
part of a nurse's duty.
"Yes, miss. And yet perhaps he ain't, you know. I thought mebbe you'd
ask the surgeon for me. I'm only a straggler here, anyway; the others
don't belong to my regiment. Heathcote was the name; Captain Ward
Heathcote. A city feller he was, but wuth a heap, for all that."
What was the matter with the nurse that she turned so pale? And now she
was gone! And without leaving the fan too. However, he could hardly have
held it. He found his little shred of lemon, lifted it to his dry lips,
and closed his eyes patiently, hardly remembering even what he had said.
Meanwhile Anne, still very pale, had drawn the surgeon outside the door,
and was questioning him. Yes, he knew that an officer had been left at
a farm-house over in the next valley; he had been asked to ride over and
see him. But how could he! As nothing had been heard from him since,
however, he was probably well by this time, and back with his regiment
again.
"Probably"--the very word she had herself used when answering the
soldier. How inactive and cowardly it seemed now! "I must go across to
this next valley," she said.
"My dear Miss Douglas!" said Dr. Flower, a grave, portly man, whose
ideas moved as slowly as his small fat-encircled eyes.
"I know a Mr. Heathcote; this may be the same person. The Mr. Heathcote
I know is engaged to a friend of mine, a lady to whom I am much
indebted. I must learn whether this officer in the next valley is he."
"But even if it is the same man, no doubt he is doing well over there.
Otherwise we should have heard from them before this time," said the
surgeon, sensibly.
But Anne did not stop at sense. "It is probable, but not certain. There
must be no room for doubt. If _you_ will ride over, I will stay.
Otherwise I must go."
"I can not leave; it is impossible."
"Where can I procure a horse, then?"
"I do not think I ought to allow it, Miss Douglas. It is nearly fifteen
miles to the next valley; of course you can not go alone, and I can not
spare Mary Crane to go with you." The surgeon spoke decidedly; he had
daughters of his own at home, and felt himself responsible for this
young nurse.
Anne looked at him. "Oh, do help me!" she cried, with an outburst of
sudden emotion. "I must go; even if I go alone, and walk every step of
the way, I must, must go!"
Dr. Caleb Flower was a slow man; but anything he had once learned he
remembered. He now recognized the presence of what he called "one of
those intense impulses which make even timid women for the time being
inflexible as adamant."
"You will have to pay largely for horses and a guide," he said, in
order to gain time, inwardly regretting meanwhile that he had not the
power to tie this nurse to her chair.
"I have a little money with me."
"But even if horses are found, you can not go alone; and, as I said
before, I can not spare Mary."
"Why would not Diana do?" said Anne.
"Diana!" exclaimed Dr. Flower, his lips puckering as if to form a long
whistle.
Diana was a middle-aged negro woman, who, with her husband, July, lived
in a cabin near the mill, acting as laundress for the hospital. She was
a silent, austere woman; in her there was little of the
light-heartedness and plenitude of person which generally belong to her
race. A devout Baptist, quoting more texts to the sick soldiers than
they liked when she was employed in the hospital, chanting hymns in a
low voice while hanging out the clothes, Diana had need of her
austerity, industry, and leanness to balance July, who was the most
light-hearted, lazy, and rotund negro in the mountains.
"But you know that Mary Crane has orders not to leave you?" said Dr.
Flower.
"I did not know it."
"Yes; so she tells me. The ladies of the Aid Society who sent her
arranged it. And I wish with all my heart that our other young nurses
were as well taken care of!" added the surgeon, a comical expression
coming into his small eyes.
"On ordinary occasions I would not, of course, interfere with these
orders," said Anne, "but on this I must. You must trust me with Diana,
doctor--Diana and July. They will take good care of me."
"I suppose I shall _have_ to yield, Miss Douglas. But I regret, regret
exceedingly, that I have not full authority over you. I feel it
necessary to say formally that your going is against my wishes and my
advice. And now, since you _will_ have your own way in any case, I must
do what I can for you."
An hour later, two mules were ascending the mountain-side, following an
old trail; Anne was on one, the tall grave Diana on the other. July
walked in front, with his gun over his shoulder.
"No danjah hyah," he assured them volubly; "soldiers doan' come up dis
yer way at all. Dey go draggin' 'long in de mud below always; seem to
like 'em."
But Anne was not thinking of danger. "Could we not go faster by the
road?" she asked.
"'Spec's we could, miss. But wudn't darst to, ef I was you."
"No, no, miss," said Diana. "Best keep along in dese yere woods; dey's
safe."
The hours were endless. At last it seemed to Anne as if they were not
moving at all, but merely sitting still in their saddles, while a
continuous procession of low trees and high bushes filed slowly past
them, now pointing upward, now slanting downward, according to the
nature of the ground. In reality they were moving forward, crossing a
spur of the mountain, but so dense was the foliage of the thicket, and
so winding the path, that they could not see three feet in any
direction, and all sense of advance was therefore lost. Anne fell into a
mental lethargy, which was troubled every now and then by that strange
sense of having seen particular objects before which occasionally haunts
the brain. Now it was a tree, now a bird; or was it that she had known
July in some far-off anterior existence, and that he had kicked a stone
from his path in precisely that same way?
It was late twilight when, after a long descent still shrouded in the
interminable thicket, the path came out suddenly upon a road, and Anne's
eyes seemed to herself to expand as the view expanded. She saw a valley,
the gray smoothness of water, and here and there roofs. July had stopped
the mules in the shadow.
"Can you tell me which house it mought be, miss?" he asked, in a low,
cautious tone.
"No," replied Anne. "But the person I am trying to find is named
Heathcote--Captain Heathcote. We must make inquiries."
[Illustration: "JULY WALKED IN FRONT, WITH HIS GUN OVER HIS
SHOULDER."]
"Now do be keerful, miss," urged July, keeping Anne's mule back.
"I'll jes' go and peer roun' a bit. But you stay hyar with Di."
"Yes, miss," said Diana. "We'll go back in de woods a piece, and wait.
July'll fin' out all about 'em."
Whether willingly or unwillingly, Anne was obliged to yield; the two
women rode back into the woods, and July stole away cautiously upon his
errand.
It was ten o'clock before he returned; Anne had dismounted, and was
walking impatiently to and fro in the warm darkness.
"Found 'em, miss," said July. "But it's cl'ar 'cross de valley.
Howsomever, valley's safe, dey say, and you can ride right along ober."
"Was it Mr. Heathcote?" said Anne, as the mules trotted down a
cross-road and over a bridge, July keeping up with a long loping run.
"Yes, miss; Heathcote's de name. I saw him, and moughty sick he looked."
"What did he say?"
"Fever's in him head, miss, and didn't say nothing. Senses clean done
gone."
Anne had not thought of this, it changed her task at once. He would not
know her; she could do all that was necessary in safety, and then go
unrecognized away. "What will he say?" she had asked herself a thousand
times. Now, he would say nothing, and all would be simple and easy.
"Dis yere's de place," said July, pausing.
It was a low farm-house with a slanting roof; there was a light in the
window, and the door stood open. Anne, springing from her saddle, and
followed by Diana, hastened up the little garden path. At first there
seemed to be no one in the room into which the house door opened; then a
slight sound behind a curtain in one corner attracted her attention, and
going across, she drew aside the drapery. The head moving restlessly to
and fro on the pillow, with closed eyes and drawn mouth, was that of
Ward Heathcote.
She spoke his name; the eyes opened and rested upon her, but there was
no recognition in the glance.
"Bless you! his senses has been gone for days," said the farmer's wife,
coming up behind her and looking at her patient impartially. "He don't
know nobody no more'n a day-old baby!"