A Lady's Choice

by Sandra Robbins

  Matron Herndon leaned over her and sneered. “Have it your way, Princess. We’ll send you to your cell for now, but we’ll see you later.”

  Without saying another word, Sarah allowed herself to be lifted and stood upright. Ruth held on to her to keep her from falling and supported her as she stumbled from the room. Minutes later Ruth helped her into her cell and onto her cot.

  Blood still oozed from Sarah’s nostrils, her stomach cramped, and her head swam in dizziness, but if felt good to be in a familiar bed. She pulled the sour smelling cover over her shoulders and turned to the wall.

  Ruth left the cell and returned a few minutes later. She pulled the dirty blanket from the bed and spread another over Sarah. The fresh scent of soap drifted up to Sarah, and she curled into the softness of the clean coverlet.

  The memory of a baseball field and a woman with the kindest smile she’d ever encountered entered her foggy mind, and she smiled. “Thank you, Ellen, for being my friend.”

  Sarah jerked from the edge of sleep and looked up. Ruth Cochran, not Ellen, stood over her. This wasn’t a baseball field. It was a prison, and she was more alone than she had ever been in her life. “I think I must have talked in my sleep. Thanks for the clean blanket.”

  Ruth knelt down beside the bed. “Sarah, do you have any family I need to notify? Maybe Ellen.”

  Sarah felt the tears well in her eyes. “I have an uncle and aunt. Ellen is someone who was very kind to me when my mother was dying.”

  “Let me contact your uncle and aunt or Ellen.”

  “No. They don’t know I’ve been arrested, and I don’t want them to worry.”

  “Isn’t there anyone else?”

  Words someone else had spoken drifted through her mind. “If you ever need me, let me know. I’ll come for you wherever you are. That’s my promise to you.”

  But Alex had another life now, and she had turned her back on him. A tear rolled from the corner of her eye. “No, there’s no one else.”

  Rush squeezed Sarah’s arm before she pushed to her feet. “I’m sorry this is happening to you. Get some sleep. I think they’ll be back for you before very long.”

  Sarah heard the key turn in the lock of the cell. They would be here for her again soon. Until then she would rest.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Sarah felt a hand on her shoulder shaking her awake. Ruth Cochran’s voice drifted into her sleep. “Sarah, it’s time to go back to the infirmary.”

  Sarah groaned and threw the blanket back. She pushed up on her elbows and tried to move her legs, but they wouldn’t respond. “Can you help me up, Ruth?”

  Ruth reached down and pulled her into a standing position. Sarah tried to take a step, but her knees wobbled and threatened to buckle under her weight. “I don’t think I can walk alone.”

  Ruth placed her arm around Sarah. “Lean on me. I’ll help you.”

  Sarah looked into Ruth’s eyes. “It gets worse each time I go. I don’t know how much more I can take.”

  “You’ve held out for five days. Give it up. It’s not worth what you’re going through.”

  “I can’t give up. I promised my father.”

  Uncontrollable coughs shook Sarah’s body, and she turned to the toilet to spit out the phlegm that rose from her throat. Her skin burned like fire, but she shivered with cold.

  Ruth felt of Sarah’s brow. “I think you have a fever.”

  “It’s nothing. Let’s go get this over.”

  They stepped from the cell, and Sarah saw Laura Barnes being led back to her cell. Two guards supported her, and Laura smiled as they passed in the hallway.

  After the ordeal, Ruth helped Sarah back to her bed. She covered her with the blanket and left the cell. She returned minutes later with another blanket. “I know you have a fever.”

  Sarah felt like she watched a play being performed. She knew that Ruth and Henrietta were there, for she heard their voices. She knew what they said, but she could not respond.

  Henrietta knelt beside Sarah and looked up at Ruth. “What do you think is the matter with her?”

  “Forced feeding can cause pneumonia if the liquid gets in the lungs. The way she’s fought it, I don’t doubt that’s what happened.”

  “Pneumonia? Oh no. What will we do?”

  “We’ll watch until tomorrow and see what happens. Do you know if she has any family?”

  Sarah reached for Ruth and grabbed her arm. “I want you to know about me in case I die.” She hesitated at the coughing that seized her. When it passed, she continued. “I have an uncle and aunt, Charlie and Clara Weston. They live in Richland Creek. Tell them I want to be buried by my mother.”

  Henrietta dissolved into tears and threw herself facedown on her bunk. Ruth patted Sarah’s arm. “Nobody’s gonna die, Sarah. But I’m glad you told me.”

  Sarah closed her eyes and succumbed to the swirling darkness pulling her downward.

  Sarah sank back on the pillow and pressed her hands over her pounding head. Cramps gripped her stomach, and her body shivered with cold. Sounds of movement came from the other cells, and she knew another morning had arrived.

  “Sarah, how are you feeling?” Henrietta’s anxious face peered down at her.

  “Horrible. I don’t think I can get out of bed.”

  Henrietta felt of her forehead. “You still have a fever. I’ll tell the guards you need to go to the infirmary.”

  “No.” Sarah reached up and grabbed Henrietta’s hand. “I go to that place enough without having to be sick there. I want to stay here in my bed.”

  The key turned in the lock, and one of the guards walked into the small cell. “You gonna get up today and eat, or are you waiting for the servants to bring it to you?”

  Henrietta stepped in front of the woman, her fists clenched at her sides. “She’s sick. Can’t you leave her alone? You’ve all done quite enough to her without coming in here and taunting her more. She’s staying in bed today.”

  Sarah’s eyes widened at the force with which Henrietta spoke. The guard glanced down at Sarah and back at the young woman blocking the bed. “Have it your way, but you’d better get yourself down the hall before all the food’s gone.”

  The woman turned and walked from the cell. Henrietta swallowed and turned toward Sarah. “I can’t believe I stood up to her. Maybe you’re a good influence on me.”

  Sarah flashed a weak smile at her friend. “You be strong on your own. You’re a kind, gentle girl, but you must stand up for yourself in this world.”

  “Maybe I’m on my way to doing that. I have to go to breakfast now, but I’ll check on you later.”

  Sarah reached for Henrietta’s arm. “What month is it? I can’t seem to remember how much time has passed since we came here.”

  “It’s the second week in November. We have about ten days left of our sentence. We’re going to make it.”

  Henrietta stepped into the hallway, leaving Sarah alone with her thoughts. Ten days and her ordeal would be over. All she had to do was stay alive. Choking coughs shook her body, and her breath wheezed in her lungs. Ten days seemed like a lifetime.

  “Are you ready?” The sinister voice chilled her blood, and she cringed at the sight of Matron Herndon. An ominous smile curled her lips, and her nostrils flared as she advanced toward her. She stopped beside the bed, threw the covers back, and jerked Sarah upright. “Let’s go have something to eat.”

  The morning feeding had been horrible, but the second one of the day proved even more of an ordeal. Sarah stumbled to the toilet and braced herself to keep from falling. Her body heaved and retched the thick liquid from the feeding. A sour smell floated up from the mixture floating in the bowl, and she wondered what they combined to make such a distasteful substance.

  When she expelled the last bit, she doubled over in pain at the coughing spasms that attacked. She gasped for breath and tried to control the hacking that shook her body, but it only caused her to cough harder. Henrietta would return soon from supper, and
she didn’t want the girl to think her illness worse. She staggered to the bed and tumbled onto the cot just as the cell-block doors opened.

  Henrietta rushed in and sat on the floor by Sarah’s cot, her brows pulled across the top of her nose in a tiny frown. She looked over her shoulder and waited for the guard to lock the door before she spoke.

  “Sarah, are you awake?”

  “Yes.”

  “I have some news, and I want to make sure you understand what I say. Can you hear me?”

  Sarah tried to focus on Henrietta’s face, but it kept floating before her eyes. “I can hear you. What is it?”

  “At supper, one of the kitchen workers told us there was an attack on the women picketing at the White House today. Agnes Morey, you know the one from Boston, was assaulted by two soldiers, and they jabbed her broken banner pole between her eyes. Dora Lewis, that sweet little grandmother from Philadelphia, was mauled by three young boys.”

  Sarah tried to prop up on her elbows. “Are they all right?”

  “I don’t know. They were arrested, and the rumor is that they’ll arrive here tonight.”

  “Sarah and Henrietta.” They jumped at the intrusion of the voice and turned to see Ruth standing outside the bars. “Watch yourselves tonight. I’m off duty, but some of the guards are upset over the day’s events. Get in your bunks and stay there.”

  Ruth cast a furtive glance down the hallway and moved toward the exit. Sarah lay back, her head a jumble of unanswered questions. Why would the guards be angry at them? She watched Henrietta slip into her bed and smiled at her. She closed her eyes and waited for morning.

  She hadn’t been asleep long when frenzied cries awakened her. Screams poured from the cells down the hallway, and the thud of crashing nightsticks echoed in the passage. Hurried footsteps approached their door, and a key turned in the lock.

  Sarah tried to focus on the guard at the door, but she could only tell it was a man. His voice thundered again. “Get up, prisoners.”

  Sarah shrank from the figures standing over her and scooted against the wall. Two men, their faces masked in rage, reached for her. She tried to slip from the men’s grasps, but she had no strength. She felt herself being pulled from the bed.

  Henrietta’s scream bounced off the cell walls. “No! Leave her alone. She’s sick.” Out of the corner of her eye, Sarah saw Henrietta spring from her bed and throw herself against the two attackers. One of them turned, picked up the girl, and hurled her against the wall. Henrietta’s body crumpled at the impact, and her lifeless body toppled in a heap on the floor.

  “No, no. Help her.” Sarah tried to wiggle free from her captors and get to her friend, but they tightened their grip.

  Someone leaned close to her, and a menacing voice whispered in her ear. “You’d better worry about helping yourself. You’ve given us nothing but trouble since the day you came. It’s about time you got what you deserve.”

  The two men drug her, twisting and turning, toward the door. She summoned all the saliva she could in her dry mouth and spat the small ball at one of the guards.

  He stopped and wiped his face with his free hand. He stared at the wetness between his fingers before he looked into her eyes. He stood there, a snarl curling his lower lip, before he raised his hand and slapped her with a force that rattled her teeth. He grabbed her hands and raised her arms above her head.

  “Let’s let her cool off some.”

  Cold metal encircled her wrists, and Sarah felt her body being lifted. She heard a snap and felt the guards release her. Her full weight dropped toward the floor, and she hung suspended, her body pressed against the bars.

  Sharp pains shot through her body at the pressure being exerted on her joints. She looked at her arms stretched above her head and the shackles that cut into her wrists. She stretched her legs downward in an effort to stand, but her feet dangled above the floor. Her toes barely brushed the surface.

  She twisted and turned her head in an attempt to glimpse Henrietta, but she couldn’t. “Henrietta, are you all right? Henrietta, wake up.”

  No answer came from the still form, and Sarah sobbed in fear for her friend. Screams still echoed through the hallway. Sarah pressed her face into the bars and tried to see where the sounds came from.

  Two guards at the end of the passage held a woman down, her back bent across an iron bench. The hand of one encircled her throat while he beat her face with his other. Another man held and twisted her wrists over her head.

  Other uniformed officers raced in and out of the small cells, and cries of pain and fear rang out each time they entered a new area. Had they gone mad? Why were they doing this to the prisoners?

  Sarah pulled at her shackles, but they wouldn’t budge.

  “Going somewhere?”

  She jerked her head up and stared into the menacing eyes of a guard on the other side of the bars. “Why are you doing this? We’ve done nothing to deserve this.”

  The man glanced over her form hanging from the bars and smirked. “I thought in your work you could stand anything. Sweet dreams.”

  Without speaking again, the officers pushed the woman who had been beaten in the hall into her small room and banged shut all the doors they had entered. They walked from the cellblock and turned off all lights on the way out.

  For the first time since coming to Occoquan, no light shone through the darkness. The black night crept across the floor and obscured everything from sight. Wails drifted from the cells through the murky hallway.

  “Why, oh, why?”

  “Sweet Jesus, help us.”

  Sarah pressed her head between her arms to block the pitiful cries, but the weeping surrounded her from every direction.

  Suddenly a voice rose above all the others, a soothing one lifted in song. “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound,” it sang.

  A hush fell over the area, crying ceased, and voices joined in. The song, a familiar one from her days of attending church with her mother, engulfed her. The voices sang on and on, reaching a crescendo with the final words, “We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise than when we’ve just begun.”

  The cellblock quieted, and sobs no longer could be heard. Soon, sounds of sleep filled the night, but Sarah’s aching and feverish body hung from the bars.

  The minutes turned to hours. Her arms felt like they were being pulled from their sockets by her weight, and any attempt to change her position added extra pain. Coughing bouts racked her chest, and her skin grew hotter by the minute. She shivered from the cold and wondered at her temperature.

  “Henrietta.” She called out to her friend from time to time, but no answer came.

  The clock from the sewing room downstairs chimed midnight, and she realized six more hours had to pass before the new shift of guards would arrive. Would they release her, or would they leave her hanging as a warning to others?

  She felt herself slipping toward unconsciousness and fought to stay awake. She could barely breathe now, and she knew her lungs were filling with fluid. If she slept, she might drown in the mucous filling her body.

  Her head lolled against her shoulder, and she tried to straighten to relieve her labored breathing. Her chest hurt, and she felt as if she were drowning. She opened her mouth to scream for help, but she only succeeded in producing a soft moan. Was there nobody to help? Was she to die alone hanging with her arms suspended above her head?

  Then the words of the song the women had sung earlier drifted into her fevered mind, and she thought of her mother. She had always received such pleasure from attending church, singing hymns, and praying. Sarah had enjoyed it once too, until her father’s death. Her faith had waned when he died, and it had disappeared with the passing of her mother. She hadn’t prayed in years.

  In her mind she could see the church at Richland Creek and the faces of the people who worshiped there. She hadn’t intended to like them, but she had come to know their kindness and their concern for her and her mother. Uncle Charlie and Aunt Clara had supplied
them a house to live in, and Ellen had welcomed her from the first.

  Then there’d been the most important one of all—Alex. She would never forget how he had looked the day he rode through the rain after her mother’s funeral to tell her how much he loved her. He had begged her not to leave, and she had walked away from him and the love he offered.

  The truth flashed into her head, and her body jerked against her bonds. God hadn’t forsaken her during the days when she felt so alone. He had taken her to a community of people who offered her love and support, but she had been so filled with self-pity she couldn’t see what He’d given her. She had made the choice to turn her back on Him and everyone else who loved her. Instead she had chosen the false friendship of a murderer and his aunt.

  Tonight she hung shackled to the bars of her cell and had listened to the voices around her sing of God’s amazing grace. It suddenly became clear to her that God had never deserted her. He was only waiting for her to come back to Him. She wasn’t alone. She had never been alone. All she had to do was reach out to Him.

  She closed her eyes and prayed for the first time in years. “Forgive me, Lord, for the years I’ve wasted, and the hurt I’ve given to others. Thank You for loving me and dying for my sins. Take care of Alex and give him a good life. I give myself into Your hands.”

  “Alex, I love you,” she whispered. “Bury me by my mother.”

  Her head dipped, her body sagged, and she welcomed the blackness overtaking her.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Sarah opened her eyes and turned her nose into her pillow. The smell of disinfectant hovered in the air, and she knew she wasn’t lying on her cot. She could make out the forms of several people beside her bed, but she couldn’t tell who they were. She lay very still and tried to make out the words above her that were being spoken in hushed tones.

  “How is she, doctor?” The voice came from far away and sounded like someone calling into the depths of a well.

  “She’s very ill. The malnutrition coupled with the pneumonia has caused serious infection throughout her body.”