CHAPTER XVI
On every highway, across every wood trail, footpath, and meadowstreamed the wreckage of seven battle-fields. Through mud and raincrowded heavy artillery, waggons, herds of bellowing cattle,infantry, light batteries, exhausted men, wounded men, dead men onstretchers, men in straw-filled carts, some alive, some dying.Cannoneers cut traces and urged their jaded horses through thecrush, cursed and screamed at by those on foot, menaced by bayonetsand sabres. The infantry, drenched, starving, plastered with mudto the waists, toiled doggedly on through the darkness; batteriesin deplorable condition struggled from mud hole to mud hole; thereserve cavalry division, cut out and forced east, limped wearilyahead, its rear-guard firing at every step.
To the north, immense quantities of stores--clothing, provisions,material of every description were on fire, darkening the sky withrolling, inky clouds; an entire army corps with heavy artillery andbaggage crossed the river enveloped in the pitchy, cinder-ladensmoke from two bridges on fire. The forests, which had been felledfrom the Golden Farm to Fair Oaks to form an army's vast abattis,were burning in sections, sending roaring tornadoes of flame intorifle pits, redoubts, and abandoned fortifications. Cannonthundered at Ellison's Mills; shells rained hard on Gaines's Farm;a thousand simultaneous volleys of musketry mingled with the awfuluproar of the cannon; uninterrupted sheets of light from the shellsbrightened the smoke pall like the continuous flare of electricityagainst a thundercloud. The Confederacy, victorious, was advancingwrapped in flame and smoke.
At Savage's Station the long railroad bridge was now on fire;trains and locomotives burned fiercely; millions of boxes of hardbread, barrels of flour, rice, sugar, coffee, salt pork, cases ofshoes, underclothing, shirts, uniforms, tin-ware, blankets,ponchos, harness, medical stores, were in flames; magazines ofammunition, flat cars and box cars loaded with powder, shells, andcartridges blazed and exploded, hurling jets and spouting fountainsof fire to the very zenith.
And through the White Oak Swamp rode the Commander-in-chief of anarmy in full retreat, followed by his enormous staff and escort,abandoning the siege of Richmond, and leaving to their fate thewretched mass of sick and wounded in the dreadful hospitals atLiberty Hall. And the red battle flags of the Southland flutteredon every hill.
Claymore's mixed brigade, still holding together, closed the rearof Porter's powder-scorched _corps d'armee_.
The Zouaves of the 3rd Regiment--what was left of them--marched asflankers; McDunn's battery, still intact, was forced to unlimberevery few rods; and the pouring rain turned to a driving goldenfire in the red glare of the guns, which lighted up the haltedsquadrons of the Lancers ranged always in support.
Every rod in retreat was a running combat. In the darkness thedischarge of the Zouaves' rifles ran from the guns' muzzles likestreams of molten metal spilling out on the grass. McDunn's gunsspirted great lumps of incandescence; the fuses of the shells inthe sky showered the darkness with swarming sparks.
Toward ten o'clock the harried column halted on a hill andbivouacked without fires, food, or shelter. The Zouaves slept ontheir arms in the drenched herbage; the Lancers, not daring tounsaddle, lay down on the grass under their patient horses, bridletied to wrist. An awful anxiety clutched officers and men. Fewslept; the ceaseless and agonised shrieking from an emergencyhospital somewhere near them in the darkness almost unnerved them.
At dawn shells began to plunge downward among the Dragoons.McDunn's battery roused itself to reply, but muddy staff-officersarrived at full speed with orders for Claymore to make haste; andthe starving command staggered off stiffly through the mud, theirears sickened by the piteous appeals of the wounded begging not tobe abandoned.
Berkley, his face a mass of bloody rags, gazed from his wet saddlewith feverish eyes at the brave contract surgeons standing silentamid their wounded under the cedar trees.
Cripples hobbled along the lines, beseeching, imploring, catchingat stirrups, plucking feebly, blindly at the horses' manes forsupport.
"Oh, my God!" sobbed a wounded artilleryman, lifting himself fromthe blood-stained grass, "is this what I enlisted for? Are youboys going to leave us behind to rot in rebel prisons?"
"Damn you!" shrieked another, "you ain't licked! What'n hell areyou runnin' away for? Gimme a gun an' a hoss an' I'll go back withyou to the river!"
And another pointed a mangled and shaking hand at the passinghorsemen.
"Oh, hell!" he sneered, "we don't expect anything of the cavalry,but why are them Zouaves skedaddlin'? They fit like wild cats atthe river. Halt! you red-legged devils. You're goin' the wrongway!"
A Sister of Charity, her snowy, wide-winged headdress limp in therain, came out of a shed and stood at the roadside, slender handsjoined imploringly.
"You mustn't leave your own wounded," she kept repeating. "Youwouldn't do that, gentlemen, would you? They've behaved so well;they've done all that they could. Won't somebody tell GeneralMcClellan how brave they were? If he knew, he would never leavethem here."
The Lancers looked down at her miserably as they rode; ColonelArran passed her, saluting, but with heavy, flushed face averted;Berkley, burning with fever, leaned from his saddle, cap in hand.
"We can't help it, Sister. The same thing may happen to us in anhour. But we'll surely come back; you never must doubt that!"
Farther on they came on a broken-down ambulance, the mules gone,several dead men half buried in the wet straw, and two Sisters ofCharity standing near by in pallid despair.
Colonel Arran offered them lead-horses, but they were timid andfrightened; and Burgess gave his horse to the older one, andBerkley took the other up behind him, where she sat sidewaysclutching his belt, white coiffe aflutter, feet dangling.
At noon the regiment halted for forage and rations procured from awaggon train which had attempted to cross their line of march. Therain ceased: a hot sun set their drenched clothing and theirhorses' flanks steaming. At two o'clock they resumed their route;the ragged, rain-blackened pennons on the lance heads dried outscarlet; a hot breeze set in, carrying with it the distant noise ofbattle.
All that afternoon the heavy sound of the cannonade jarred theirears. And at sunset it had not ceased.
Berkley's Sister of Charity clung to his belt in silence for awhile. After a mile or two she began to free her mind in regard tothe distressing situation of her companion and herself. Sheinformed Berkley that the negro drivers had become frightened andhad cut the traces and galloped off; that she and the other Sisterwere on their way to the new base at Azalea Court House, wherethousands of badly wounded were being gathered from the battles ofthe last week, and where conditions were said to be deplorable,although the hospital boats had been taking the sick to Alexandriaas fast as they could be loaded.
She was a gentle little thing, with ideas of her own concerning thedisaster to the army which was abandoning thousands of its woundedto the charity and the prisons of an enemy already too poor to feedand clothe its own.
"Some of our Sisters stayed behind, and many of the medical staffand even the contract surgeons remained. I hope the rebels will begentle with them. I expected to stay, but Sister Aurelienne and Iwere ordered to Azalea last night. I almost cried my eyes out whenI left our wounded. The shells were coming into the hospitalyesterday, and one of them killed two of our wounded in the straw.Oh, it was sad and terrible. I am sure the rebels didn't fire onus on purpose. Do you think so?"
"No, I don't. Were you frightened, Sister."
"Oh, yes," she said naively, "and I wished I could run into thewoods and hide."
"But you didn't?"
"Why, no, I couldn't," she said, surprised.
The fever in his wound was making him light-headed. At intervalshe imagined that it was Ailsa seated behind him, her arms aroundhis waist, her breath cool and fragrant on his neck; and still heknew she was a phantom born of fever, and dared not speak--becamesly, pretending he did not know her lest the spell break and shevanish into thin air again.
; What the little sister said was becoming to him only a prettyconfusion of soft sounds; at moments he was too deaf to hear hervoice at all; then he heard it and still believed it to be Ailsawho was speaking; then, for a, few seconds, reality cleared hisclouded senses; he heard the steady thunder of the cannonade, thesteady clattering splash of his squadron; felt the hot, dry windscorching his stiffened cheek and scalp where the wound burned andthrobbed under a clotted bandage.
When the regiment halted to fill canteens the little sister washedand re-bandaged his face and head.
It was a ragged slash running from the left ear across thecheek-bone and eyebrow into the hair above the temple--a deep,swollen, angry wound.
"What _were_ you doing when you got this?" she asked in softconsternation, making him as comfortable as possible with thescanty resources of her medical satchel. Later, when the buglessounded, she came back from somewhere down the line, suffered himto lift her up behind him, settled herself, slipped both armsconfidently around his waist, and said:
"So you are the soldier who took the Confederate battle flag? Whydidn't you tell me? Ah--I know. The bravest never tell."
"There is nothing to tell," he replied. "They captured a guidonfrom us. It evens the affair."
She said, after a moment's thought; "It speaks well for a man tohave his comrades praise him as yours praise you."
"You mean the trooper Burgess," he said wearily. "He's alwayschattering."
"All who spoke to me praised you," she observed. "Your colonelsaid: 'He does not understand what fear is. He is absolutelyfearless.'"
"My colonel has been misinformed, Sister. I am intelligent enoughto be afraid--philosopher enough to realise that it doesn't helpme. So nowadays I just go ahead."
"Trusting in God," she murmured.
He did not answer.
"Is it not true, soldier?"
But the fever was again transfiguring her into the shape of AilsaPaige, and he remained shyly silent, fearing to disturb thevision--yet knowing vaguely that it was one.
She sighed; later, in silence, she repeated some Credos and HailMarys, her eyes fixed on space, the heavy cannonade dinning in herears. All around her rode the Lancers, tall pennoned weaponsswinging from stirrup and loop, bridles loose under their claspedhands. The men seemed stupefied with fatigue; yet every now andthen they roused themselves to inquire after her comfort or tooffer her a place behind them. She timidly asked Berkley if shetired him, but he begged her to stay, alarmed lest the vision ofAilsa depart with her; and she remained, feeling contented andsecure in her drowsy fatigue. Colonel Arran dropped back from thehead of the column once to ride beside her. He questioned herkindly; spoke to Berkley, also, asking with grave concern about hiswound. And Berkley answered in his expressionless way that he didnot suffer.
But the little Sister of Charity behind his back laid one fingeracross her lips and looked significantly at Colonel Arran; and whenthe colonel again rode to the head of the weary column his faceseemed even graver and more careworn.
By late afternoon they were beyond sound of the cannonade, ridingthrough a golden light between fields of stacked wheat. Far behindin the valley they could see the bayonets of the Zouavesglistening; farther still the declining sun glimmered on the gunsof the 10th battery. Along a parallel road endless lines ofwaggons stretched from north to south, escorted by Egerton'sDragoons.
To Berkley the sunset world had become only an infernal pit ofscarlet strung with raw nerves. The terrible pain in his face andhead almost made him lose consciousnesss. Later he seemed to bedrifting into a lurid sea of darkness, where he no longer felt hissaddle or the movement of his horse; he scarcely saw the lanternsclustering, scarcely heard the increasing murmur around him, theracket of picket firing, the noise of many bewildered men, thecries of staff-officers directing divisions and brigades to theircamping ground, the confused tumult which grew nearer, nearer,mounting like the ominous clamour of the sea as the regiment rodethrough Azalea under the July stars.
He might have fallen from his saddle; or somebody perhaps liftedhim, for all he knew. In the glare of torches he found himselflying on a moving stretcher. After that he felt straw under him;and vaguely wondered why it did not catch fire from his body, whichsurely now was but a mass of smouldering flame.
For days the fever wasted him--not entirely, for at intervals heheard cannon, and always the interminable picket firing; and heheard bugles, too, and recognised the various summons. But it wasno use trying to obey them--no use trying to find his legs. Hecould not get up without his legs--he laughed weakly at thethought; then, drowsy, indifferent, decided that they had been shotaway, but could not remember when; and it bothered him a good deal.
Other things bothered him; he was convinced that his mother was inthe room. At intervals he was aware of Hallam's handsome face, cutout like a paper picture from _Harper's Weekly_ and pasted flat onthe tent wall. Also there were too many fire zouaves around hisbed--if it was a bed, this vague vibrating hammock he occupied. Itwas much more like a hollow nook inside a gigantic pendulum whichswung eternally to and fro until it swung him intosenselessness--or aroused him with fierce struggles to escape.But his mother's slender hand sometimes arrested the maddeningmotion, or--and this was curiously restful--she cleverlytransferred him to a cradle, which she rocked, leaning close overhim. Only she kept him wrapped up too warmly.
And after a long while there came a day when his face becamecooler, and his skin grew wet with sweat; and on that day he partlyunclosed his eyes and saw Colonel Arran sitting beside him.
Surprised, he attempted to sit up, but not a muscle of his bodyobeyed him, and he lay there stupid, inert, hollow eyes fixedmeaninglessly on his superior, who spoke cautiously.
"Berkley, do you know me?"
His lips twitched a voiceless affirmative.
Colonel Arran said: "You are going to get well, now. . . . Getwell quickly, because--the regiment misses you. . . . What is ityou desire to say? Make the effort if you wish."
Berkley's sunken eyes remained focussed on space; he was trying toconsider. Then they turned painfully toward Colonel Arran again.
"Ailsa Paige?" he whispered.
The other said quietly: "She is at the base hospital near Azalea.I have seen her. She is well. . . . I did not tell her you wereill. She could not have left anyway. . . . Matters are not goingwell with the army, Berkley."
"Whipped?" His lips barely formed the question.
Colonel Arran's careworn features flushed.
"The army has been withdrawing from the Peninsula. It is thecommander-in-chief who has been defeated--not the Army of thePotomac."
"Back?"
"Yes, certainly we shall go back. This rebellion seems to betaking more time to extinguish than the people and the nationalauthorities supposed it would require. But no man must doubt ourultimate success. I do not doubt it. I never shall. You mustnot. It will all come right in the end."
"Regiment?" whispered Berkley.
"The regiment is in better shape, Berkley. Our remounts havearrived; our wounded are under shelter, and comfortable. We needrest, and we're getting it here at Azalea, although they shell usevery day. We ought to be in good trim in a couple of weeks.You'll be in the saddle long before that. Your squadron has becomevery proud of you; all the men in the regiment have inquired aboutyou. Private Burgess spends his time off duty under the oak treesout yonder watching your window like a dog. . . . I--ah--may sayto you, Berkley, that you--ah--have become a credit to theregiment. Personally--and as your commanding officer--I wish youto understand that I am gratified by your conduct. I have said soin my official reports."
Berkley's sunken eyes had reverted to the man beside him. After amoment his lips moved again in soundless inquiry.
Colonel Arran replied: "The Zouaves were very badly cut up; MajorLent was wounded by a sabre cut. He is nearly well now. ColonelCraig and his son were not hurt. The Zouaves are in cantonmentabout a mile to the rear. Both
Colonel Craig and his son have beenhere to see you--" he hesitated, rose, stood a moment undecided.
"Mrs. Craig--the wife of Colonel Craig--has been here. Herplantation, Paigecourt, is in this vicinity I believe. She hasrequested the medical authorities to send you to her house for yourconvalescence. Do you wish to go?"
The hollow-eyed, heavily bandaged face looked up at him from thestraw; and Colonel Arran looked down at it, lips aquiver.
"Berkley--if you go there, I shall not see you again until youreturn to the regiment. I--" suddenly his gray face began totwitch again--and he set his jaw savagely to control it.
"Good-bye," he said. . . "I wish--some day--you could try to thinkless harshly of me. I am a--very--lonely man."
Berkley closed his eyes, but whether from weakness or sullenresentment the older man could not know. He stood looking downwistfully at the boy for a moment, then turned and went heavilyaway with blurred eyes that did not recognise the woman in bonnetand light summer gown who was entering the hospital tent. As hestood aside to let her pass he heard his name pronounced, in acold, decisive voice; and, passing his gloved hand across his eyesto clear them, recognised Celia Craig.
"Colonel Arran," she said coolly, "is it necessa'y fo' me torequest yo' permission befo' I am allowed to move Philip Berkley tomy own house?"
"No, madam. The brigade surgeon is in charge. But I think I cansecure for you the necessary authority to do so if you wish."
She thanked him haughtily, and passed on; and he turned and walkedout, impassive, silent, a stoop to his massive shoulders which hadalready become characteristic.
And that evening Berkley lay at Paigecourt in the chintz-hungchamber where, as a girl, his mother had often slept, dreaming thedreams that haunt young hearts when the jasmine fragrance growsheavier in the stillness and the magnolia's snowy chalice isoffered to the moon, and the thrush sings in the river thickets,and the fire-fly's lamp drifts through the fairy woods.
Celia told him this on the third day, late in the afternoon--solate that the westering sun was already touching the crests of theoak woods, and all the thickets had turned softly purple like thebloom on a plum; the mounting scent of phlox from the garden wasgrowing sweeter, and the bats fluttered and dipped and soared inthe calm evening sky.
She had been talking of his mother when she was Constance Paige andwore a fillet over her dark ringlets and rode to hounds at ten withthe hardest riders in all Prince Clarence County.
"And this was her own room, Phil; nothing in it has been moved,nothing changed; this is the same bird and garland chintz, matchingthe same wall-paper; this is the same old baid with its fo' ca'vedcolumns and its faded canopy, the same gilt mirror where she lookedand saw reflected there the loveliest face in all the valley. . . .A child's face, Phil--even a child's face when she drew aside herbridal veil to look. . . . Ah--God--" She sighed, looking down ather clasped hands, "if youth but knew--if youth but knew!"
He lay silent, the interminable rattle of picket firing in hisears, his face turned toward the window. Through it he could seegreen grass, a magnolia in bloom, and a long flawless spray ofCherokee roses pendant from the gallery.
Celia sighed, waited for him to speak, sighed again, and picked upthe Baltimore newspaper to resume her reading if he desired.
Searching the columns listlessly, she scanned the headings, glancedover the letter press in silence, then turned the crumpled page.Presently she frowned.
"Listen to this, Philip; they say that there is yellow fever amongthe Yankee troops in Louisiana. It would be like them to bringthat horror into the Ca'linas and Virginia----"
He turned his head suddenly, partly rose from where he lay; and shecaught her breath and bent swiftly over him, placing one hand onhis arm and gently forcing him down upon the-pillow again.
"Fo'give me, dear," she faltered. "I forgot what I was reading----"
He said, thoughtfully: "Did you ever hear exactly how my motherdied, Celia? . . . But I know you never did. . . . And I think Ihad better tell you."
"She died in the fever camp at Silver Bayou, when you were a littlelad," whispered Celia.
"No."
"Philip! What are you saying?"
"You don't know how my mother died," he said quietly.
"Phil, we had the papers--and the Governor of Louisiana wrote ushimse'f----"
"I know what he wrote and what the papers published was not true.I'll tell you how she died. When I was old enough to take care ofmyself I went to Silver Bayou. . . . Many people in that town haddied; some still survived. I found the parish records. I foundone of the camp doctors who remembered that accursed year ofplague--an old man, withered, indifferent, sleeping his days awayon the rotting gallery of his tumble-down house. _He_ knew. . . .And I found some of the militia still surviving; and one among themretained a confused memory of my mother--among the horrors of thatpoisonous year----"
He lay silent, considering; then: "I was old enough to remember,but not old enough to understand what I understood later. . . . Doyou want to know how my mother died?"
Celia's lips moved in amazed assent.
"Then I will tell you. . . . They had guards north, east, and westof us. They had gone mad with fright; the whole land wasquarantined against us; musket, flintlock, shotgun, faced usthrough the smoke of their burning turpentine. I was only a littlelad, but the horror of it I have never forgotten, nor my mother'sterror--not for herself, for me."
He lay on his side, thin hands clasped, looking not at Celia butbeyond her at the dreadful scene his fancy was painting on the wallof his mother's room:
"Often, at night, we heard the shots along the dead line. Oncethey murdered a man behind our water garden. Our negroes moanedand sobbed all day, all night, helpless, utterly demoralised. Twowere shot swimming; one came back dying from snake bite. I saw himdead on the porch.
"I saw men fall down in the street with the black vomit--women,also--and once I saw two little children lying dead against agarden wall in St. Catharine's Alley. I was young, but I remember."
A terrible pallor came into his wan face.
"And I remember my mother," he said; "and her pleading with the menwho came to the house to let her send me across the river wherethere was no fever. I remember her saying that it was murder toimprison children there in Silver Bayou; that I was perfectly wellso far. They refused. Soldiers came and went. Their captaindied; others died, we heard. Then my mother's maid, Alice, anoctoroon, died on the East Gallery. And the quarters went insanethat day.
"When night came an old body-servant of my grandfather scratched atmother's door. I heard him. I thought it was Death. I was halfdead with terror when mother awoke and whispered to me to dress inthe dark and to make no sound.
"I remember it perfectly--remember saying: 'I won't go if youdon't, mother. I'd rather be with you.' And I remember hersaying: 'You shall not stay here to die when you are perfectlywell. Trust mother, darling; Jerry will take you to SainteJacqueline in a boat.'
"And after that it is vaguer--the garden, the trench dug under thenorth wall--and how mother and I, in deadly fear of moccasins, downon all fours, crept after Jerry along the ditch to the water'sedge----"
His face whitened again; he lay silent for a while, crushing hiswasted hands together.
"Celia, they fired on us from the levee. After that I don't know;I never knew what happened. But that doctor at Silver Bayou saidthat I was found a mile below in a boat with the first marks of theplague yellowing my skin. Celia, they never found my mother'sbody. It is not true that she died of fever at Silver Bayou. Shefell under the murderous rifles of the levee guard--gave her lifetrying to save me from that pest-stricken prison. Jerry's body wasfound stranded in the mud twenty miles below. He had been shotthrough the body. . . . And now you know how my mother died."
He raised himself on one elbow, watching Celia's shocked white facefor a moment or two, then wearily turned toward the window and sankback on his pillows.
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p; In the still twilight, far away through the steady fusillade fromthe outposts, he heard the dull boom-booming of cannon, and theheavy shocks of the great guns aboard the Union gun-boats. But itsounded very far off; a mocking-bird sang close under his window;the last rosy bar faded from the fleecy cloud bank in the east.Night came abruptly--the swift Southern darkness quickly emblazonedwith stars; and the whip-poor-wills began their ghostly calling;and the spectres of the mist crept stealthily inland.
"Celia?"
Her soft voice answered from the darkness near him.
He said: "I knew this was her room before you told me. I have seenher several times."
"Good God, Phil!" she faltered, "what are you saying?"
"I don't know. . . . I saw her the night I came here."
After a long silence Celia rose and lighted a candle. Holding it alittle above her pallid face she glided to his bedside and lookeddown at him. After a moment, bending, she touched his face withher palm; then her cool finger-tips brushed the quiet pulse at hiswrist.
"Have I any fever?"
"No, Phil."
"I thought not. . . . I saw mother's face a few moments ago inthat mirror behind you."
Celia sank down on the bed's edge, the candle trembling in herhand. Then, slowly, she turned her head and looked over hershoulder, moving cautiously, until her fascinated eyes found theglass behind her. The mirror hung there reflecting the floweredwall opposite; a corner of the bed; nothing else.
He said in an even voice;
"From the first hour that you brought me into this room, she hasbeen here. I knew it instantly. . . . The first day she wasbehind those curtains--was there a long while. I knew she wasthere; I watched the curtains, expecting her to step out. I waitedall day, not understanding that I--that it was better that I shouldspeak. I fell asleep about dusk. She came out then and sat whereyou are sitting."
"It was a dream, Phil. It was fever. Try to realise what you aresaying!"
"I do. The next evening I lay watching; and I saw a figurereflected in the mirror. It was not yet dusk. Celia, in thesunset light I saw her standing by the curtains. But it wasstar-light before she came to the bed and looked down at me.
"I said very quietly: 'Mother dear!' _Then_ she spoke to me; and Iknew she was speaking, but I could not hear her voice. . . . Itwas that way while she stood beside me--I could not hear her,Celia. I could not hear what she was saying. It was no spirit Isaw--no phantom from the dead there by my bed, no ghost--norestless wraith, grave-driven through the night. I believe she isliving. She knows I believe it. . . . As you sat here, a momentago, reading to me, I saw her reflected for a moment in the mirrorbehind you, passing into the room beyond. Her hair is perfectlywhite, Celia--or," he said vaguely to himself, "was it somethingshe wore?--like the bandeaux of the Sisters of Charity----"
The lighted candle fell from Celia's nerveless fingers and rolledover and over across the floor, trailing a smoking wick. Berkley'shand steadied her trembling arm.
"Why are you frightened?" he asked calmly.
"There is nothing dead about what I saw."
"I c-can't he'p myse'f," stammered Celia; "you say such frightfulthings to me--you tell me that they happen in my own house--in_her_ own room--How can I be calm? How can I believe such thingsof--of Constance Berkley--of yo' daid mother----"
"I don't know," he said dully.
The star-light sparkled on the silver candle-stick where it lay onthe floor in a little pool of wax. Quivering all over, Celiastooped to lift, relight it, and set it on the table. And, overher shoulder, he saw a slim shape enter the doorway.
"Mother dear?" he whispered.
And Celia turned with a cry and stood swaying there in the rays ofthe candle.
But it was only a Sister of Charity--a slim, childish figure underthe wide white head-dress--who had halted, startled at Celia's cry.She was looking for the Division Medical Director, and the sentrieshad misinformed her--and she was very sorry, very deeply distressedto have frightened anybody--but the case was urgent--a Sister shotnear the picket line on Monday; and authority to send her Northwas, what she had come to seek. Because the Sister had lost hermind completely, had gone insane, and no longer knew them, knewnobody, not even herself, nor the hospital, nor the doctors, noreven that she lay on a battle-field. And she was saying strangeand dreadful things about herself and about people nobody had everheard of. . . . Could anybody tell her where the Division MedicalDirector could be found?
It was not yet daybreak when Berkley awoke in his bed to findlights in the room and medical officers passing swiftly hither andthither, the red flames from their candles blowing smokily in thebreezy doorways.
The picket firing along the river had not ceased. At the sameinstant he felt the concussion of heavy guns shaking his bed. Thelawn outside the drawn curtains resounded with the hurrying clatterof waggons, the noise of pick and spade and crack of hammer andmallet.
He drew himself to a sitting posture. A regimental surgeon passingthrough the room glanced at him humorously, saying: "You've got apretty snug berth here, son. How does it feel to sleep in a realbed?" And, extinguishing his candle, he went away through the doorwithout waiting for any answer.
Berkley turned toward the window, striving to reach the drawncurtains. And at length he managed to part them, but it was alldark outside. Yet the grounds were evidently crowded with waggonsand men; he recognised sounds which indicated that tents were beingerected, drains and sinks dug; the rattle of planks and boards weresignificant of preparation for the construction of "shebangs."
Farther away on the dark highway he could hear the swift gallop ofcavalry and the thudding clank of light batteries, all passing inperfect darkness. Then, leaning closer to the sill, he gazedbetween the curtains far into the southwest; and saw the tall curveof Confederate shells traced in whirling fire far down the river,the awful glare of light as the enormous guns on the Union warshipsreplied.
Celia, her lovely hair over her shoulders, a scarf covering hernight-dress, came in carrying a lighted candle; and instantly avoice from outside the window bade her extinguish the light or drawthe curtain.
She looked at Berkley in a startled manner, blew out the flame, andcame around between his bed and the window, drawing the curtainsentirely aside.
"General Claymore's staff has filled eve'y room in the house exceptyours and mine," she said in her gentle, bewildered way. "There'sa regiment--Curt's Zouaves--encamped befo' the west quarters, and abattery across the drive, and all the garden is full of theirhorses and caissons."
"Poor little Celia," he said, reaching out to touch her hand, anddrawing her to the bed's edge, where she sat down helplessly.
"The Yankee officers are all over the house," she repeated."They're up in the cupola with night-glasses now. They are ve'ypolite. Curt took off his riding boots and went to sleep on mybed--and oh he is so dirty!--my darling Curt' my own husband!--toodirty to touch! I could cry just to look at his uniform, all blackand stained and the gold entirely gone from one sleeve! AndStephen!--oh, Phil, some mise'ble barber has shaved the heads ofall the Zouaves, and Steve is perfectly disfigured!--the poor, dearboy"--she laughed hysterically--"he had a hot bath and I've beenmending the rags that he and Curt call unifo'ms--and I found cleanflannels fo' them both in the attic----"
"_What_ does all this mean--all this camping outside?" heinterrupted gently.
"Curt doesn't know. The camps and hospitals west of us have beenshelled, and all the river roads are packed full of ambulances andstretchers going east."
"Where is my regiment?"
"The Lancers rode away yesterday with General Stoneman--all excepthaidqua'ters and one squadron--yours, I think--and they are actingescort to General Sykes at the overseers house beyond the oakgrove. Your colonel is on his staff, I believe."
He lay silent, watching the burning fuses of the shells as theysoared up into the night, whirling like fiery planets on theiraxes, higher, higher, mounting through majest
ic altitudes to thepallid stars, then, curving, falling faster, faster, till theirswift downward glare split the darkness into broad sheets of light.
"Phil," she whispered, "I think there is a house on fire across theriver!"
Far away in the darkness rows of tiny windows in an unseen mansionhad suddenly become brilliantly visible.
"It--it must be Mr. Ruffin's house," she said in an awed voice."Oh, Phil! It _is_! Look! It's all on fire--it's--oh, see theflames on the roof! This is terrible--terrible--" She caught herbreath.
"Phil! There's another house on fire! Do you see--do you _see_!It's Ailsa's house--Marye-mead! Oh, how could they set it onfire--how could they have the heart to burn that sweet old place!"
"Is that Marye-mead?" he asked.
"It _must_ be. That's where it ought to stand--and--oh! oh! it'sall on fire, Phil, all on fire!"
"Shells from the gun-boats," he muttered, watching the entire skyturn crimson as the flames burst into fury, lighting up clumps oftrees and outhouses. And, as they looked, the windows of anotherhouse began to kindle ominously; little tongues of fire flutteredover a distant cupola, leaped across to a gallery, ran up invinelike tendrils which flowered into flame, veining everything ina riotous tangle of brilliancy. And through the kindling darknessthe sinister boom--boom! of the guns never ceased, and the shellscontinued to mount, curve, and fall, streaking the night withgolden incandescence.
Outside the gates, at the end of the cedar-lined avenue, where thehighway passes, the tumult was increasing every moment amid shouts,cracking of whips, the jingle and clash of traces and metallicracket of wheels. The house, too, resounded with the heavy hurriedtread of army boots trampling up and down stairs and crossing thefloors above in every direction.
In the summer kitchen loud-voiced soldiers were cooking; there camethe clatter of plates from the dining-room, the odour of hot breadand frying pork.
"All my negroes except old Peter and a quadroon maid have gonecrazy," said Celia hopelessly. "I had them so comfo'tablyqua'tered and provided foh!--Cary, the ove'seer, would have lookedafter them while the war lasts--but the sight of the blue uniformsunbalanced them, and they swa'med to the river, where thecontraband boats were taking runaways. . . . Such foolishcreatures! They were ve'y happy here and quite safe and welltreated. . . . And everyone has deserted, old and young!--totingtheir bundles and baskets on their silly haids--every negro onPaigecourt plantation, every servant in this house except Peter andSadie has gone with the contrabands . . . I'm sure I don't knowwhat these soldiers are cooking in the kitchen. I expect they'llend by setting the place afire, and I told Curt so, but he can'the'p it, and I can't. It's ve'y hard to see the house turned outof the windows, and the lawns and gardens cut to pieces by hoofsand wheels, but I'm only too thankful that Curt can find shelterunder this roof, and nothing matters any mo' as long as he andStephen are alive and well."
"Haven't you heard from Ailsa yet?" asked Berkley in a low voice.
"Oh, Phil! I'm certainly worried. She was expecting to go onboard some hospital boat at the landing the day befo' your regimentarrived. I haven't set eyes on her since. A gun-boat was to takeone of the Commission's steamers to Fortress Monroe, and all thatday the fleet kept on firing at our--at the Confederate batteriesover the river"--she corrected herself wearily--"and I was soafraid, that Ailsa's steamer would try to get out----"
"Did it?"
"I don't know. There are so many, many boats at the landing, andthere's been so much firing, and nobody seems to know what ishappening or where anybody is. . . . And I don't know where Ailsais, and I've been ve'y mise'ble because they say some volunteernurses have been killed----"
"What!"
"I didn't want to tell you, Phil--until you were better----"
"Tell me what?" he managed to say, though a terrible fear wasstiffening his lips and throat.
She said dully: "They get shot sometimes. You remember yo'se'fwhat that Sister of Charity said last night. I heard Ailsacautioning Letty--the little nurse, Miss Lynden----"
"Yes, I know. What else?"
Celia's underlip quivered: "Nothing, only Ailsa told me that shewas ordered to the field hospital fo' duty befo' she went aboardthe commission boat--and she never came back--and there was abattle all that day----"
"Is that all?" he demanded, rising on one elbow. "Is thereanything else you are concealing?"
"No, Phil. I'd tell you if there was. Perhaps I'm foolish to beso nervous--but I don't know--that Sister of Charity struck by abullet--and to think of Ailsa out there under fire--" She closedher eyes and sat shivering in the gray chill of the dawn, the tearssilently stealing over her pale cheeks. Berkley stared out of thewindow at a confused and indistinct mass of waggons and tents andmoving men, but the light was still too dim to distinguishuniforms; and presently Celia leaned forward and drew the curtains.
Then she turned and took Berkley's hands in hers.
"Phil, dear," she said softly, "I suspect how it is with you andAilsa. Am I indiscreet to speak befo' you give me any warrant?"
He said nothing.
"The child certainly is in love with you. A blind woman coulddivine that," continued Celia wistfully. "I am glad, Phil, becauseI believe you are as truly devoted to her as she is to you. Andwhen the time comes--if God spares you both----"
"You are mistaken," he said quietly, "there is no future before us."
She coloured in consternation. "Wh--why I certainlysupposed--believed----"
"Celia!"
"W-what, dear?"
"Don't you _know_ I cannot marry?"
"Why not, Philip?"
"Could I marry Ailsa Craig unless I first told her that my fatherand my mother were never married?" he said steadily.
"Oh, Philip!" she cried, tears starting to her eyes again, "do youthink that would weigh with a girl who is so truly and unselfishlyin love with you?"
"You don't understand," he said wearily. "I'd take _that_ chancenow. But do you think me disloyal enough to confess to any womanon earth what my mother, if she were living, would sacrifice hervery life to conceal?"
He bent his head, supporting it in his hands, speaking as though tohimself:
"I believe that the brain is the vehicle, not the origin ofthought. I believe a brain becomes a mind only when an immortalityexterior to ourselves animates it. And this is what is called thesoul. . . . Whatever it is, it is what I saw--or what that_something_, exterior to my body, recognised.
"Perhaps these human eyes of mine did not see her. Something thatbelongs to me saw the immortal visitor; something, that is thevital part of me, saw, recognised, and was recognised."
For a long while they sat there, silent; the booming guns shook thewindow; the clatter and uproar of the passing waggon train filledtheir ears.
Suddenly the house rocked under the stunning crash of a huge gun.Celia sprang to her feet, caught at the curtain as another terrificblast shivered the window-panes and filled the room with acrid dust.
Through the stinging clouds of powdered plaster Colonel Craigentered the room, hastily pulling on his slashed coat as he came.
"There's a fort in the rear of us--don't be frightened, Celia. Ithink they must be firing at----"
His voice was drowned in the thunder of another gun; Celia made herway to him, hid her face on his breast as the room shook again andthe plaster fell from the ceiling, filling the room with blindingdust.
"Oh, Curt," she gasped, "this is dreadful. Philip cannot stayhere----"
"Better pull the sheets over his head," said her husband, meetingBerkley's eyes with a ghost of a smile. "It won't last long; andthere are no rebel batteries that can reach Paigecourt." He kissedher. "How are you feeling, dear? I'm trying to arrange for you togo North on the first decent transport----"
"I want to stay with you, Curt," she pleaded, tightening her armsaround his neck. "Can't I stay as long as my husband and son arehere? I don't wish to go----"
"You can't stay," he said gently
. "There is no immediate dangerhere at Paigecourt, but the army is turning this landing into avast pest hole. It's deadly unhealthy. I wish you to go home justas soon as I can secure transportation----"
"And let them burn Paigecourt? Who is there to look after----"
"We'll have to take such chances, Celia. The main thing is for youto pack up and go home as soon as you possibly can. . . . I've gotto go out now. I'll try to come back to-night. The Generalunderstands that it's your house, and that you are my wife; andthere's a guard placed and a Union flag hung out from thegallery----"
She looked up quickly; a pink flush stained her neck and forehead.
"I would not use that wicked flag to protect myse'f," she saidquietly--"nor to save this house, either, Curt. It's only fo' youand Phil that I care what happens to anything now----"
"Then go North, you bad little rebel!" whispered her husband,drawing her into his arms. "Paige and Marye have been desertedlong enough; and you've seen sufficient of this war--plenty to lastyour lifetime----"
"I saw Ailsa's house burn," she said slowly.
"Marye-mead. When?"
"This mo'ning, Curt. Phil thinks it was the shells from thegun-boats. It can't be he'ped now; it's gone. So is EdmundRuffin's. And I wish I knew where that child, Ailsa, is. I'm thatfrightened and mise'ble, Curt----"
An orderly suddenly appeared at the door; her husband kissed herand hurried away. The outer door swung wide, letting in a brassyclangour of bugles and a roll of drums, which softened when thedoor closed with a snap.
It opened again abruptly, and a thin, gray-garbed figure came in,hesitated, and Celia turned, staring through her tears:
"Miss Lynden!" she exclaimed. "Is Ailsa here?"
Berkley sat up and leaned forward, looking at her intently from themass of bandages.
"Letty!" he said, "where is Mrs. Paige?"
Celia had caught the girl's hands in hers, and was searching herthin white face with anxious eyes; and Letty shook her head andlooked wonderingly at Berkley.
"Nothing has happened to her," she said. "A Sister of Mercy waswounded in the field hospital near Azalea, and they sent for Mrs.Paige to fill her place temporarily. And," looking from Celia toBerkley, "she is well and unhurt. The fighting is farther westnow. Mrs. Paige heard yesterday that the 8th Lancers were encampednear Paigecourt and asked me to find Mr. Berkley--and deliver aletter----"
She smiled, drew from her satchel a letter, and, disengaging herother hand from Celia's, went over to the bed and placed it inBerkley's hands.
"She is quite well," repeated Letty reassuringly; and, to Celia:"She sends her love to you and to your husband and son, and wishesto know how they are and where their regiment is stationed."
"You sweet little thing!" said Celia, impulsively taking her intoher arms and kissing her pale face. "My husband and my son aresafe and well, thank God, and my cousin, Phil Berkley, isconvalescent, and you may tell my sister-in-law that we all wereworried most to death at not hearing from her. And now I'm goingto get you a cup of broth--you poor little white-faced child! Howdid you ever get here?"
"Our ambulance brought me. We had sick men to send North. Ailsacouldn't leave, so she asked me to come."
She accepted a chair near the bed. Celia went away to prepare somebreakfast with the aid of old Peter and Sadie, her maid. And assoon as she left the room Letty sprang to her feet and wentstraight to Berkley.
"I did not tell the entire truth," she said in a low, excitedvoice. "I heard your regiment was here; Ailsa learned it from me.I was coming anyway to see you."
"To see me, Letty?" he repeated, surprised and smiling.
"Yes," she said, losing what little colour remained in her cheeks."I am in--in much--anxiety--to know--what to do."
"Can _I_ help you?"
She looked wistfully at him; the tears rushed into her eyes; shedropped on her knees at his bedside and hid her face on his hands.
"She dropped on her knees at his bedside and hid herface on his hands."]
"Letty--Letty!" he said in astonishment, "what on earth hashappened?"
She looked up, lips quivering, striving to meet his gaze throughher tears.
"Dr. Benton is here. . . . He--he has asked me to--marry him."
Berkley lay silent, watching her intently.
"Oh, I know--I know," she sobbed. "I can't, can I? I should haveto tell him--and he would never speak to me again--never write tome--never be what he has been all these months!--I know I cannotmarry him. I came to tell you--to ask--but it's no use--no use. Iknew what you would say----"
"Letty! Wait a moment----"
She rose, controlling herself with a desperate effort.
"Forgive me, Mr. Berkley; I didn't mean to break down; but I'm sotired--and--I wanted you--I needed to hear you tell me what wasright. . . . But I knew already. Even if I were--were treacherousenough to marry him--I know he would find me out. . . . I can'tget away from it--I can't seem to get away. Yesterday, in camp,the 20th Cavalry halted--and there was John Casson!--And I nearlydropped dead beside Dr. Benton--oh the punishment for what Idid!--the awful punishment!--and Casson stared at me and said: 'MyLord, Letty! is that you?'"
She buried her burning cheeks in her hands.
"I did not lie to him. I offered him my hand; and perhaps he sawthe agony in my face, for he didn't say anything about theCanterbury, but he took off his forage cap and was pleasant andkind. And he and Dr. Benton spoke to each other until the buglessounded for the regiment to mount."
She flung her slender arm out in a tragic gesture toward thehorizon. "The world is not wide enough to hide in," she said in aheart-breaking voice. "I thought it was--but there is noshelter--no place--no place in all the earth!"
"Letty," he said slowly, "if your Dr. Benton is the man I think heis--and I once knew him well enough to judge--he is the only man onearth fit to hear the confession you have made this day to me."
She looked at him, bewildered.
"I advise you to love him and marry him. Tell him about yourselfif you choose; or don't tell him. There is a vast amount ofnonsense talked about the moral necessity of turning one's selfinside out the moment one comes to marry. Let me tell you, few mencan do it; and their fiancees survive the shock. So, few men areasses enough to try it. As for women, few have any confessions tomake. A few have. You are one."
"Yes," she whispered.
"But I wouldn't if I were you. If ever any man or woman took thechance of salvation and made the most of it, that person is you!And I'm going to tell you that I wouldn't hesitate to marry you ifI loved you."
"W-what!"
He laughed. "Not one second! It's a good partnership for anyplan. Don't be afraid that you can't meet men on their own level.You're above most of us now; and you're mounting steadily. There,that's my opinion of you--that you're a good woman, and a charmingone; and Benton is devilish lucky to get you. . . . Come here,Letty."
She went to him as though dazed; and he took both her hands in his.
"Don't you know," he said, "that I have seen you, day after day,intimately associated with the woman I love? Can you understandnow that I am telling the truth when I say, let the past bury itsghosts; and go on living as you have lived from the moment thatyour chance came to live nobly. I know what you have made ofyourself. I know what the chances were against you. You are abetter woman to-day than many who will die untempted. And youshall not doubt it, Letty. What a soul is born into is often fineand noble; what a soul makes of itself is beyond all praise.
"Choose your own way; tell him or not; but if you love him, giveyourself to him. Whether or not you tell him, he will want you--asI would--as any man would. . . . Now you must smile at me, Letty."
She turned toward him a face, pallid, enraptured, transfigured withan inward radiance that left him silent--graver after that swiftglimpse of a soul exalted.
She said slowly: "You and Ailsa have been God's own messengers tome. . . . I shall tell Dr. Benton
. . . . If he still wishes it, Iwill marry him. It will be for him to ask--after he knows all."
Celia entered, carrying the breakfast on a tray.
"Curt's Zouaves have stolen ev'y pig, but I found bacon and po'k inthe cellar," she said, smilingly. "Oh, dear! the flo' is in such amess of plaster! Will you sit on the aidge of the bed, MissLynden, and he'p my cousin eat this hot co'n pone?"
So the napkin was spread over the sheets, and pillows tucked behindBerkley; and Celia and Letty fed him, and Letty drank her coffeeand thankfully ate her bacon and corn pone, telling them both,between bites, how it had been with her and with Ailsa since thegreat retreat set in, swamping all hospitals with the sick andwounded of an unbeaten but disheartened army, now doomed todecimation by disease.
"It was dreadful," she said. "We could hear the firing for milesand miles, and nobody knew what was happening. But all thenorthern papers said it was one great victory after another, and webelieved them. All the regimental bands at the Landing played; andeverybody was so excited. We all expected to hear that our armywas in Richmond."
Celia reddened to the ears, and her lips tightened, but she saidnothing; and Letty went on, unconscious of the fiery emotionsawaking in Celia's breast:
"Everybody was so cheerful and happy in the hospital--all thosepoor sick soldiers," she said, "and everybody was beginning to planto go home, thinking the war had nearly ended. I thought so, too,and I was so glad. And then, somehow, people began to get uneasy;and the first stragglers appeared. . . . Oh, it did seemincredible at first; we wouldn't believe that the siege of Richmondhad been abandoned."
She smiled drearily. "I've found out that it is very easy tobelieve what you want to believe in this world. . . . Will youhave some more broth, Mr. Berkley?"
Before he could answer the door opened and a red zouave came in,carrying his rifle and knapsack.
"Mother," he said in an awed voice, "Jimmy Lent is dead!"
"What!"
He looked stupidly around the room, resting his eyes on Letty andBerkley, then dropped heavily onto a chair.
"Jim's dead," he repeated vacantly. "He only arrived hereyesterday--transferred from his militia to McDunn's battery. Andnow he's dead. Some one had better write to Camilla. I'm afraidto. . . . A shell hit him last night--oh--he's all torn topieces--and Major Lent doesn't know it, either. . . . Father letme come; we're ordered across the river; good-bye, mother--" Herose and put his arms around her.
"You'll write to Camilla, won't you?" he said. "Tell her I loveher. I didn't know it until just a few minutes ago. But I do,mother. I'd like to marry her. Tell her not to cry too much.Jimmy was playing cards, they say, and a big shell fell inside theredoubt. Philip--I think you knew Harry Sayre? Transferred fromthe 7th to the Zouaves as lieutenant in the 5th company?"
"Yes. Was he killed?"
"Oh, Lord, yes; everybody in the shebang except Arthur Wye was alltorn to pieces. Tommy Atherton, too; you knew him, of course--5thZouaves. He happened in--just visiting Arthur Wye. They were allplaying cards in a half finished bomb-proof. . . . Mother, you_will_ write to Camilla, won't you, dear? Good-bye--good-bye,Phil--and Miss Lynden!" He caught his mother in his arms for alast hug, wrenched himself free, and ran back across the hall,bayonet and canteen clanking.
"Oh, why are they sending Curt's regiment across the river?" wailedCelia, following to the window. "Look at them, Phil! Can you see?The road is full of Zouaves--there's a whole regiment of them inblue, too. The batteries are all harnessed up; do you thinkthere's going to be another battle? I don't know why they want tofight any mo'!" she exclaimed in sudden wrath and anguish. "Idon't understand why they are not willing to leave the South alone.My husband will be killed, and my only son--like Jimmy Lent--ifthey don't ever stop this wicked fighting----"
The roar of a heavy gun buried the room in plaster dust. Lettycalmly lifted the tray from the bed and set it on a table. Thenvery sweetly and with absolute composure she took leave of Celiaand of Berkley. They saw her climb into an ambulance which wasdrawn up on the grass.
Then Berkley opened the letter that Letty had brought him:
"This is just a hurried line to ask you a few questions. Do youknow a soldier named Arthur Wye? He is serving now as artillerymanin the 10th N. Y. Flying Battery, Captain McDunn. Are youacquainted with a lieutenant in the 5th Zouaves, named Cortlandt?I believe he is known to his intimates as Billy or 'Pop' Cortlandt.Are they trustworthy and reliable men? Where did you meet MissLynden and how long have you known her? Please answer immediately.
"AILSA PAIGE."
Wondering, vaguely uneasy, he read and re-read this note, so unlikeAilsa, so brief, so disturbing in its direct coupling of the peoplein whose company he had first met Letty Lynden. . . . Yet, onreflection, he dismissed apprehension, Ailsa was too fine acharacter to permit any change in her manner to humiliate Lettyeven if, by hazard, knowledge of the unhappy past had come to herconcerning the pretty, pallid nurse of Sainte Ursula.
As for Arthur Wye and Billy Cortlandt, they were incapable ofanything contemptible or malicious.
He asked Celia for a pencil and paper, and, propped on his pillows,he wrote:
"My darling, I don't exactly understand your message, but I guessit's all right. To answer it:
"Billy Cortlandt and Arthur Wye are old New York friends of mine.Their words are better than other people's bonds. Letty Lynden isa sweet, charming girl. I regret that I have not known her yearslonger than I have. I am sending this in haste to catch Letty'sambulance just departing, though still blocked by artillery passingthe main road. Can you come? I love you.
"PHILIP BERKLEY."
Celia sent her coloured man running after the ambulance. He caughtit just as it started on. Berkley, from his window, saw theservant deliver his note to Letty.
He had not answered the two questions concerning Letty. He couldnot. So he had evaded them.
Preoccupied, still conscious of the lingering sense of uneasiness,he turned on his pillows and looked out of the window.
An enormous cloud of white smoke rose curling from the river,another, another; and boom! boom! boom! came the solid thunder ofcannon. The gunboats at the Landing were opening fire; cavalrywere leading their horses aboard transports; and far down the roadthe sun glistened on a long column of scarlet, where the 3rdZouaves were marching to their boats.
The sharpshooters had already begun to trouble them. Theirofficers ordered them to lie down while awaiting their turn toembark. After a while many of the men sat up on the ground tostretch and look about them, Stephen among the others. And amoment later a conoidal bullet struck him square in the chest andknocked him flat in the dirt among his comrades.
Ailsa Paige: A Novel Page 16
