Measure of Devotion, page 29
Her eyes crushed closed, she spat out words. “My arm, I-I can’t—”
“There are worse places to get hit. Lay still, damn you!”
“I can’t…I can’t feel my fingers!”
He swore when another hidden rebel fired. “We have to get after them. Look, Coop, the arm’s a bit crooked.”
Squirming, she growled through her teeth, low and long. It’s broken. “Tim—don’t…don’t let them take it! Don’t—”
He put a hand on her breastbone and held her to the ground. “If you don’t quit thrashing, I’ll sit on you!” She stilled, though not completely. Searing pain made that impossible. “Probably just a normal break,” he said “like when I fell off my horse as a kid. Stop thinking the worst. Was a pistol bullet, not a minié. Big difference.”
Another random shot came from the woods, followed instantly by a massive explosion of cannon munitions. The ground beneath her shook and Coop covered her face with her good arm as shrapnel whizzed around them. Comrades wailed. Tim fell across her chest.
His weight pushed the air from her lungs, but shock had already seized them.
“Tim!” She reached across his back and grabbed a fistful of his frock. Her broken arm screaming in protest, she pulled with all her strength, and rolled him over her and off, onto his back. “Tim!” Blood poured from a huge gap in his throat, the work of an iron fragment.
“Good, Jesus!” From her knees, her deadened arm at her side, Coop clapped her hand to the opening, but blood bubbled around her fingers, ran freely beyond the heel of her hand. Hers simply wasn’t big enough.
She shouted over her shoulder. “Help here! Need a stretcher! Doc!” A frantic scan of the area showed soldiers racing into the woods in pursuit, soldiers writhing on the ground, and no medical personnel.
“Hold on, Tim! Hold on!” I won’t lose you! She let go long enough to grip her limp arm, and knowing what was to come, took a breath. In a blink, she hauled it onto his chest and her numb hand onto his wound. Pain sent a flash of black across her vision and bile rose up her throat, but she put her good hand to the gash as well and pressed, trying to close it. “Hold on, my brother.” Again, she looked up and screamed for help.
“Come on, Tim. You can do this.” Please. Please. Not Tim.
“C-coop.” His voice, barely audible.
Her eyes filled. “I’m here. I got you.”
“Mary.”
“I know, Tim. Rest easy. D-don’t talk.” She blinked to glance around again. “Help here! Stretcher!”
“Love her,” he said through a gurgle of blood. “Always.” His eyes fluttered.
“She loves you, too, Tim. Forever.”
“You…Sophie…”
You’re thinking of me at this moment? Such a beautiful soul you are, Pvt. Tim Doten.
“Sh. Quiet now.” Coop snapped her head to fling off tears. Her hands were lost in his blood. “Help here!” she screamed long and hard.
He started to gag, and his chest heaved beneath her limp arm. “Deserve…” He coughed. “Love Sophie…forever.”
A sob jammed her throat. “I-I’ll try, Tim. P-please keep quiet.”
“Do it.” He blinked, coughed, and his eyes opened wide, full of urgency and wonder. “You,” he managed through a gurgle, and coughed again. Blood pooled at his lips. Forcing out words, he sent it streaming from the corner of his mouth. “Secret…long time.”
Coop’s breath caught. Couldn’t have heard correctly. A sob escaped. “You’re the finest of m-men, Timothy Doten. I love you, m-my brother.”
He gagged, convulsed, and Coop blinked as hard as she could, desperate for decent vision. Then a hard and final cough seemed to clear his airway. “Love y-you, Coop…brave s-sister.”
Chapter Thirty-two
Coop swayed in the wagon, coddled her broken forearm in its sling, and considered her life now to be as circuitous and challenging as this road north to Frederick City. With any luck, and she knew she was brassy to expect more, she’d be healing at home in a week or so, and she trusted the salty ocean air, the familiar fields in their mid-October finery to revive the spirit that had empowered her these past couple of years. A spirit sorely in need.
She pinched the fingertips of her left hand but felt nothing. If the nerves healed, she might start feeling things in a few months, according to the doctor, but he offered no guarantee. Although she was lucky to have the limb at all, the diagnosis still stung, especially when topped by the heartache of losing Tim.
He knew so much more than he showed. A brother as close as Cooper had ever been.
And then there was Sophie’s letter. None before had laid Coop so low. Finally reading it last night, during her stay at the aid station, Coop felt a second devastating tragedy sink her already-leaden spirit to new depths.
As if the Bauer family hadn’t endured enough sorrow this summer. Coop’s heart broke again, for Sophie and the children and their family’s love for each other. She remembered Sophie’s father fondly, had looked forward to more time with him, and sensed that, ultimately, he would accept Catherine in his daughter’s life.
Sophie wrote of her family’s spiritual grief, how all three of them cried constantly. But she also confirmed her affection for Coop, said she envisioned a shared, loving future, and wrote how she had been eager to travel—until tragedy struck and committed her to the farm and her siblings.
Coop struggled to reassess her dream of the two of them in her homestead, a place of their own. Tragedies now weighed down her thinking: the loss of a true friend, the passing of Sophie’s father, the acquisition of what probably was a permanent impairment, and Sophie’s intentions.
Bumping along, the wounded around her in the wagon moaned, some dozed, others read, and she watched the sunny countryside pass, trying to see a way forward. She dug Sophie’s letter from her knapsack and reread the last page.
…As one who has forever dreamed for a heart to chime in harmony with mine, I yearn for your company and tenderness, Coop, in every way. Your beautiful words, your affections humble me, touch me deeply. How they warm and awaken my heart’s desires. I read them at least once each day, for they are a balm to this struggling soul.
You are courageous beyond my words here. Your heart is wonderous and true, and memory of it beating with mine in our embrace provides strength I so dearly need. I dream of us sharing every day, no matter where, no matter the activity, and no matter the opinion of others, for my heart belongs to you.
Here now, however, amidst my family’s great loss, it grieves me to say that dreams must remain dreams. I relate to your longing for your dear family home, and I am so very proud of your fight to preserve rights we all cherish. You have bravely taken fantastical measures to remain true to yourself. No one respects, treasures, that effort more than I. But as for me, fate has decided that I provide upbringing and security for Greta and Karl through their tender years, here on our farm in Gettysburg. I still work to accept this and can only hope that your selfless and kind heart will do the same.
I miss you madly, my dearest Coop. Please do secure the very first furlough possible because time is interminable without your company, your exquisite kiss. With great longing and anticipation, I look forward to our next glorious embrace.
May safety and good fortune accompany you at every step, my darling kindred soul.
Yours truly,
Sophie
“That face of yours says you ain’t writin’ back any time soon.”
Coop looked down at the soldier lying beside her. The 42nd New York’s Silas Benning had one less leg now, lost during a failed rush to save his commander, Colonel Mallon. His graying hair reached out from beneath his torn cap, his haggard face overgrown by an unkempt mustache and beard. She doubted he was as old as he looked and wondered how he played the harmonica through all that hairy growth.
He raised bushy eyebrows and held up a whiskey bottle. She accepted.
“I’ll write when we stop tonight,” she said. The harsh spirits burned in her empty stomach. “Sometimes, it’s hard to know the right words.”
“Y’love her?”
Coop stared at the pages, her thoughts racing. I truly do. My heart leaps at the very thought of her. She nodded, took another drink, and returned the bottle.
“Then you’ll find the words eventually. We all do, don’t we?” He snorted and drank. “Have y’told her yet? ’Cause you better. Women need to hear it. A lot.” He paused before taking another swig. “The wife’s farewell advice.”
“Not just women who need it.” She glanced down at him again, saw he’d drifted away in thought. “Sorry about your wife.”
He shrugged and handed her the bottle. “I s’pose I could’ve shown more caring, done a bigger part for our future, but…Men are pigheaded, y’know? And here I lay. Gonna be a lonely peg-leg printer now.”
“You’re one strong cuss, Benning.” She drank a smaller amount this time before giving back the bottle. “You can run a press on a store-bought leg. All things considered, you’re a lucky man.”
He shrugged again. “You, too, not losing the arm. It’s broke?”
“Pistol shot. The break will heal, but nerves to the hand probably won’t. Doc wasn’t hopeful.”
“That’s tough, too, bein’ single-handed.” As an afterthought, he backhanded her knee. “But, y’know,” he grabbed his privates, “y’only need just one.”
“You are the dog everyone says.”
He laughed as he pulled himself into a sitting position. “What do you do back home?”
“Hay and wheat, mostly.”
“Hm. Gonna need a hand with that.” He chuckled at himself. “So, marry the lady, Samson, tackle those crops together.”
Coop stared out at the roadside again. Cooper Samson marries Sophie Bauer. Uh-huh. I’m too much of a realist to imagine such a thing. Not in this century, anyway. Actually, she cursed her inability to devote heavy thinking to any one issue because so many crowded her brain, rushed around, vying for individual attention.
She did know, however, that what she felt for Sophie could not be forsaken. A powerful force inside said she must not—could not—simply enjoy some time with her and move on with her Massachusetts dream, regardless of how loudly it called. There would be agony in that for both of them. She could feel the edges of it already. Still, the life and farm of her own design now beckoned from within her reach.
Coop tucked Sophie’s writings inside her shirt and sat back. A shadow darkened the dream. It widened a hollow in her chest, cast doubt on her capabilities and the measure of her heart, especially now that Sophie’s letter had faded her from view.
Would it be best to write our good-byes? We each have a calling, as imperfect and difficult as it is. I could no more ask her to leave her home than she could ask me to abandon mine. And neither of us deserves the torture of that one last kiss.
She feigned a yawn, pinched the bridge of her nose to discreetly rub away tears.
I’ll find the right words. Tonight.
She sat back and closed her eyes. Maybe a short rest won’t come with dreams this time.
But the short rest became three hours and ended with the abrupt call to disembark.
Coop straightened her legs where she sat. As she rose, she checked on Benning, snoring on the floor. She nudged him with her toe.
“Hey, peg-leg printer. Wake up.”
He grumbled at her and she smiled at his temperament as she hopped off the wagon and headed for the overnight shelters in the field.
In short order, all the wounded were situated in the flimsy tents and cookfires had the aroma of soup drifting across the encampment. Orderlies directed the walking wounded into a food line and brought trays to the immobile.
Coop ate sitting cross-legged in her shelter and studied the arrival of twilight. Days grew so short. She shrugged inside her frock. The chill would become outright cold soon and she hoped she could keep warm enough to write.
She rummaged through her knapsack until she located matches, a nub of paraffin, and her wrap of paper, envelopes, and pencil. Lighting a match single-handedly proved challenging, but after considerable cursing, she lit the candle and stood it in its own drippings on the backside of her plate. Exhaling hard, she realized how exhausting even the simplest chores would be now.
She needed a writing surface. The only fairly firm and flat item in her possession was the precious family tintype, a small, thin piece of lacquered iron encased in a folded paper mat. Coop couldn’t help but spend a minute with the image. She opened it on her knee, tilted it toward the light, and lost herself in the family she once had.
Wearing obedient, frozen smiles, the four of them stood with arms around each other, Cooper, Mother, Father, and herself, looking for all the world like farmers fresh from the barn. And Coop stared beyond them to that distant structure, so in need of repair, the barn that took her family when it fell.
Coop tore her eyes away and examined the image of herself with flowing tresses and layered dress and apron. “Such a lady you were, Catherine Samson.” The absence of regret or yearning to return to that persona didn’t surprise her. Who I am today, she thought, is the real Catherine.
She shook her head at how the image showed her dark eyes, nose, and long-jaw smile as perfect matches to her brother’s. Uncanny. How he would have ranted, seeing me in his uniform. Their relentless teasing, even as adults, came to mind, and she wondered how his soft heart would have reacted to meeting Billy after all these years. None of you will ever know.
Behind the gathering in the image, their home stood steadfast and patient, and she knew today it must look so very empty. Like herself. Perhaps, not for much longer.
October 15, 1863
My dearest Sophie,
I send heartfelt sympathies to you, Greta, and Karl on the loss of your beloved papa. Such a shock it was to read of this tragedy. I cannot conceive of the pain you all have withstood and wish these words could convey an embrace sufficient to relieve all the suffering that still weighs upon you.
I apologize for the delay in my response. We were roundly victorious at Bristoe Station, this week, but the engagement proved especially brutal for me.
A rebel pistol delivered a most problematic wound, breaking my left forearm and canceling all feeling in my hand. The break is expected to heal, but the doctor is far less optimistic about the restoration of sensation in my fingers. I hold onto hope that someday it will return.
Hardship then grew to heartbreak for me with the loss of my finest comrade, Tim Doten. The night I spent in the aid station was most trying, suffering more from his passing than my own condition. On his dying breath, he imparted to me a shocking revelation, that he had seen through my guise long ago and thought me quite brave. I was stricken dumb by this, humbled, that such a decent, honorable man should know “me” even to a minor degree. Further, I believe you will be as moved as I to know he wished us happiness together.
My time with the 19th has been suspended and I have been ordered home to recuperate, after checking in at the Frederick City hospital. My thinking is that, unlike with my injury last spring, the army has little hope for my hand, and, therefore, little use for a one-handed soldier. Although my enlistment extends for another nine months, I believe this injury brings a premature end to my service.
From your gracious letter, I see that your decision to care for Greta and Karl has been made with great consideration and love, and no one, least of all this feigned soldier, should dare question your resolve. Admittedly, I had hoped (quite presumptuously) that we might venture along a new road together, but, as you have written, the fates now lead us elsewhere. Nothing in my life has posed as great a test of my soul, for my heart and my reasoning are at war. I am caught amidst this battle, battered until weary, a solitary farmhouse between colliding forces.
As eager as I am to see my home again, to take healing comfort in those surroundings, I wish to accomplish one thing first if you will allow me. I plan to stop in Gettysburg to spend a time with you. The fates may fume, but a reunion matters more. If you prefer I forego this visit, please do respond quickly, as I hope to arrive soon.
Your correspondence of any nature is always welcome, of course. The sight of your script alone brings a smile. And always will.
Sincerely,
Coop
Chapter Thirty-three
Sophie emerged from the summer kitchen with a basket of squashes on her arm, a glass of tea in her hand, and two decently sized pumpkins balanced in her other arm. She set them on the table in the shade of the barn and waved for Eldus to join her.
“Sit. You, sir, are going to drop if you don’t rest.” She rolled two chunky logs off the nearby pile and sat them upright to use as seats. “I’m going to find some way to thank you, Eldus. I feel terrible, you finishing our barnyard. Heavens. I’m sure Rose is wondering if you’re snoozing somewhere.”
He laughed. “Oh, she knows I would lend a hand if I saw you in need, Miss Sophie. Can’t just deliver her apple crumble and run off, now, can I?”
Sophie shook her head, pleased to see him drink, pleased just to have his company, possibly because he brought forth such pleasant memories of Papa. Since his passing two weeks ago, many neighbors had stopped by, but Eldus owned a special place in her family’s heart.
And here, today, he had delivered another of Rose’s masterpieces and then spent three hours splitting rails and angling them into a fence out from the barn—three hours that would have translated into three weeks for her and Karl and Greta, or far more than she could afford even if she’d found a company from town to do it.
“Now you won’t waste your day chasing after those cows,” he said, and pointed at one meandering off the Bauer land. “You just get that one back with the other two in their new yard and then you can put the children in charge. Save yourself.”
“I look forward to that,” she said, eyeing the cow and trying to summon the energy to go after it. “Thanks to you, Eldus. Greta and Karl realize now that animals aren’t just pets, and they appreciate how much Papa did around here. More responsibility at their age is good for them.” She leaned against his shoulder. “Especially with all those chickens.”
