by Laura Briggs
She noticed the stain on his shirt, the mark of an open sore. “Your wound should be tended,” she said. “There are bandages and also some of Granny’s herbs that I can mix into a poultice.”
“The stain is an old one,” he assured her, pulling at the fabric with a thoughtful expression. “It is still painful, of course, and slows me down a little, as you see. None of that is important, though. Not when I have a proper physician to look after it for me.”
Fear trickled through her at the thought of telling him something so painful. “You should at least take something to eat after your journey,” she said, starting to rise. “It seems there was a little bread and pork left from last night’s supper—”
“Where is she, Nell?” He gripped her arm with a force that scarcely seemed possible from the starving frame. “They told me people have been sick here. Dying, even. Mariah has cared for them. She is in danger, perhaps.” He ran a hand through tangled curls, the frayed hat balanced on his knees. “Has she called at a patient’s house? I can go to her on foot if it is not too far. Otherwise, I should have to trouble your father for his second-best mare.”
“Rest awhile,” Nell encouraged, avoiding both his question and his glance as she spoke. “Your injury shouldn’t be tested this way. I am sure the doctor would agree.”
“Forget my injury,” he snapped, pushing away the hand that encouraged him to stay seated. “Mariah can advise me after we are reunited. That is all I care about and feel I will go mad with waiting. Surely that can do my health no good.” This was said with a spark of the old humor, sending a pang through her conscience.
Sitting beside him again, Nell placed her fingers firmly over his hand. “It is true there has been much sickness and death here these past weeks.” She bit her lip, searching for any way to lessen the blow. “Mariah cared for all who would let her,” she began softly, “sometimes going without sleep or food for days. She grew ill, but continued to work, with no thought for herself. I don’t know how she did it, how anyone could have unless God Himself gave them the strength.”
“Stop,” he said, voice cold with warning. “Don’t talk this way. Tell me what has happened to her, where to find her.”
Nell sobbed, unable to hold it back any longer. “She is gone from us. This morning, she succumbed to the illness. I was with her and held her hand.” Her tears were coming freely now, for she could not stop them. Before her vision blurred, she saw the pain in Arthur’s hollow face.
“It isn’t true.” Disbelief flared in the coal eyes. “After what I’ve gone through, everything I’ve lost…it can’t be. It can’t.” His words died away in a whisper of despair, hands clutching his head.
She reached to comfort him, feeling him shrug away from her.
He struggled to his feet, his steps lost for direction. “I have nothing left,” he said. “My faith, my dearest friend, the girl I loved—all taken from me. There can be no reason, no possible good to come from such loss.”
“You have friends, still,” she reminded him gently. “You have parents who love you, and a God Who never forsakes you, whatever your heart says right now.”
There was no response to this, except a faint groan. He moved to the parlor, hands resting against the desk where Mariah used to conduct her business. Shoulders stooped, he hung his head in something that resembled defeat more than a prayer.
Nothing she said at this time would be heard—that much Nell realized from her own experience with grief. For this reason she, too, rose.
“I will make you something to eat,” she said, gently. “Sit down and rest. You need your strength—Mariah would want you to take care of yourself.” With that, she went to the kitchen, preparing what few comforts she could offer Arthur, who mourned his love. Maybe when he was ready, he would find her there, and agree to hear the truth of Mariah’s sacrifice.
Arthur had left the hospital in a farmer’s cart, his tattered soldier’s coat rolled inside a blanket on his lap. The plain cotton shirt in its place made him look like a farmer’s son again, with no brass buttons or kepi hat to reference his service.
Eighty miles, then sixty lay between him and the place he called home. Two strangers from different towns provided his transportation, the second one a photographer on his way to the bigger town of Woolwich.
“Sad country out this way,” he told Arthur with a shake of the head for scrappy fields and lean-to sheds along the road. “Most folks poor as the dirt on their boots—those that has any boots, that is.”
“They do what they can,” Arthur replied, clutching the bundle of fabric that held his tattered pride. His home was a poor one compared to fine houses in cities, but no part of him wished to disown it, with the wound burning beneath his shirt to remind him what he sacrificed to protect it these past months.
Smoke curled on the horizon as they drew close to town. Arthur clutched the side of the buggy, straining for a view of the shops and sites of old. What he saw on closer inspection left him more puzzled than comforted, though.
Houses were shuttered, curtains closed against the mid-day sun. Upon more than one door, he spied a crudely painted symbol that struck him as almost pagan-like in appearance, the vivid red drawing his eye.
More troubling still was the black crepe paper strung through some of the door handles. They weren’t among the homes that sent a soldier to war, making him wonder even more for the nature of their loss.
“Spot of trouble here,” the photographer guessed, a flick of the reins slowing the horse’s pace as they drew near the business street. Closed signs were placed on doors that should read as open, the dry goods store the only place to boast a welcome message to visitors.
Arthur shouldered his bundle, climbing to the dusty lane below. Before he could fish a coin from his pocket, the photographer had urged his horses in another direction. A hand raised in farewell, he called, “Good luck to you, son,” in a voice that implied the soldier would need it in such a place.
He could use his soldier’s pay to buy a new coat, and maybe a razor to replace the one he lost with his haversack. To see Mariah was his first wish—his strongest wish—but he dreaded meeting her this way, shabby and defeated, the same figure that strangers shrank from whenever the regiment had passed through towns for supplies.
The store’s manager, Harold Girvin, peered at him through a veil of pipe smoke. “Passing through?” he asked, taking a moment to recognize the boy who used to buy penny candy from his shelves. When he did, astonishment dawned on his face—for a moment, Arthur believed he saw the glint of tears in the man’s eyes.
“So you’ve come back to us,” he said, offering a warm handshake. “It’s good to see a body come back alive. Mighty good. We heard such different tellings of that event as to make it more a fable from the old country.”
“I wish that is all it were.” He turned the subject to the strange sights that greeted him, asking, “Where is everyone? All the shops are closed but yours. Is trade so bad these days?”
The man’s face darkened. “You’ve not heard of our troubles, have you?”
It was then Arthur learned the reason for the black crepe on the door handles. Of Mariah, the manager could give no account, expect that she spent her days traveling the lanes in Crooked Wood. “That’s where the trouble started, they say. A stench in the air that makes the fog last ‘til afternoon.”
He left the shop on foot, meeting not another soul on the road to the house where she boarded. Haste made him forgo a knock on the door, pushing it open as he nearly collapsed. It was then that Nell appeared, and even then, in her face, he could read the sorrow beneath her surprise.
It was all for nothing, his journey; the time he spent treating the wound in his shoulder, face scrunched in pain as he wrapped the makeshift bandage back in place. He had clung to life just to end with more grief, a blow even greater than the one delivered to him on the battlefield. This was what ran through his head, sitting alone in the Darrow’s parlor. In thi
s place, he’d spoken to Mariah for the first time, had first felt the warmth of her touch.
If not for his faith, he would have married her. Even if it was only for a few days, they would have been together as man and wife. He felt cheated of that happiness, anger boiling inside him for the God Who made him question the wisdom of their union.
No sobs came, only hatred more intense than anything he’d known in a while. Time slipped past, unmarked by the clock in the hall as Arthur gave himself over to the despair building inside him. The numb sensation he’d come to know from weeks of lying in a hospital bed would follow, as it always did when he felt the surge of pain and anger.
Noises from the other room pulled him from his thoughts. With it came the awareness that he was hungry, his mouth dry from breathing in the dust on the road. He felt almost ashamed that basic human needs should trump his grief, pulling him back into the living world again. Slowly, he moved towards the kitchen, where Nell was busy stirring something into a kettle.
A lamp burned on the table, illuminating her small form in its calico dress. She hadn’t noticed his presence yet, intent on her work until he pulled out a chair. When she glanced up, strands of hair escaped its bun to frame the suntanned face.
They were friends of old, but part of him felt a stranger before her in the kitchen he’d visited dozens of times growing up. She had changed in some way. She’d grown older, as if grief and human struggle had worked the same changes in her as the war had wrought in him.
“This will do you good,” she said, setting a cup of tea before him. There was one at her place as well, her hands cradling it when she sat.
Both were quiet, Arthur tasting his drink with a grimace for its strong herbal flavor. Reaching past the kettle, the girl offered him a plate with a napkin covering it. “You have not been fed proper for a while,” she guessed. “It is not much, but the pork should taste better than the cornmeal Henry described.”
“He is safe—your brother,” Arthur said, uncovering the plate to find a slice of meat and some cold potatoes nestled beneath. Despite himself, his mouth watered with longing for the tastes denied him so long in camp. “Of course, you knew his fate already,” he said, “or you would have asked me about it.”
She smiled faintly. “We were all relieved to hear from Henry. I only wish he had mentioned your condition in the brief note he sent. Or that he had told us of poor Wray.” That was all she said, letting the silence return as he halfheartedly continued eating from the plate of leftovers.
When he had almost finished, Nell spoke again. “There is something I need to tell you. Something I think you will be glad to hear.”
Arthur could think of nothing that would make him glad in these circumstances. Nudging his cup aside, he said, “This brew isn’t to my liking. Something pure from the spring would be welcome, given the parched feeling in my throat.”
“I am afraid this is all we can drink,” Nell replied. “For now at least, it is all that is safe.”
“Safe?” He stared at her, not sure he heard correctly, so tired from everything, he would not be surprised if his mind were playing tricks on him.
She took a deep breath, plunging forward nervously. “Before she died, Mariah spoke to me of something in her mind. A conviction that she had found the cause of our epidemic.”
With surprise, he listened as Nell recounted all that his sweetheart supposedly said in those final breaths. “She could not have been thinking clearly,” he decided. “There was no faith in Mariah. She told me that many times.”
“Yet I saw it,” Nell replied. “I heard the sinner’s prayer from her lips.”
He frowned. “If you say this because you think it will give me comfort—”
“I say it because it is true.” She gripped his hand, small fingers locking his own in place. “Mariah did find her way in the end. She had wanted to for much longer than that, had felt the Savior calling to her. It was the reason she cried out for Him when everything else failed her. And He gave her the answer to save the rest of us from sickness.”
The press of her fingers pleaded with him to agree, but he couldn’t. “There is no comfort for me in hearing this. Not when my heart is hardened against Him. Not after everything I have seen.”
“We will find a way to soften it, then,” she said. “For Mariah would want that, too.”
27
Nell could see the stubborn hurt in his gaze, the lamplight making it darker than ever.
Arthur did not believe her.
His lips parted, saying, “I saw my faith chipping away more each month. Every time I reached for Him, something else would deepen the chasm. As if He rewarded my efforts to find Him with further indifference.”
“There have been times I doubted as well,” she said. “Especially with the plague bearing down upon us. It is not wrong to doubt, you know—only to give up hope of ever understanding.”
“How can I understand such pain? My death would have been easier to suffer than what I have lost.” Sighing, he continued, “You never loved as I did, Nell. Never felt the pull of another’s heart so deep you could only be happy if they felt the same.”
She had, although he did not know it. “Many hearts feel that way, with no chance of it being returned. Perhaps you were blessed to find one who shared your love, even for just a short time.”
“Six weeks,” he said. “That is all I had with her. Letters were a poor substitute for the time we might have shared. Had I known—” he shook his head, letting the rest go unspoken. His face was proof enough that he blamed himself, as well as God, for this misery.
“You can have no reason to regret such tenderness,” Nell said. “Not when Mariah’s prayer has made it possible to meet her again one day. That is something to be grateful for, at least.”
His answer was slow to form, brow wrinkled in deep concentration.
“Think of her faith,” she urged. “It was all you would have asked of her when you—when you wanted her to marry you. You cannot want to mock her final moments by denying them. Not when you loved her so much.”
She could see him struggle to hold back tears, his tone softening when he said, “I think…it seems there is truth in what you say. You see things more clearly than I would. Even in childhood, you had the best judgment of anyone I knew.”
She wished to avoid such praise, but there was no time, Arthur gently returning the touch of her fingers. “You must think me selfish, indulging this grief as if it belonged to me alone. I forget that you, and others we know, have suffered badly.”
This mood would be challenged, she knew, and changed every few moments over the coming days. The challenges which lay ahead would provide more pain—not the least among these would be Mariah’s burial, an event they must all face in the following day.
“I can make no promise to change my unbelief,” he said.
“I would not ask it. Not unless it was sincere. You know that, Arthur.”
He swallowed. “I would not object to trying. Were you to help me, Nell, it would be a great comfort. If I could lean on your faith until I...until I am more sure of myself.”
“Of course,” she said. “When you are ready.”
Slowly, he brought their clasped hands to rest against his forehead. She felt her fingers against his face for the first time and trembled in response. Shaky breaths escaped his frame, filling her with pity for his pain. Even if she had not loved him so deeply, she would feel it. They would always be friends—and fellow believers, too, when this time of doubt someday passed for the young man before her.
“I can think of nothing but questions.” With a deep breath he asked, “Will you pray with me, Nell? Pray for the answers. For whatever good can come out of all our pain.”
“I will,” she replied, closing her eyes at the same moment as Arthur did, their heads bowed together to seek the answers.
March 22nd, 1863: Today a few people gathered in town to honor those who were taken from us, and our deliver
y from the illness trial we endured. A simple prayer was spoken, a hymn was sung, and a bell was rung in the old manner of bidding farewell to the departed souls one has loved.
There are many kinds of love, I believe. Some come without warning, a thunderbolt in the blue sky. Others take a slower path to find us. My own has mostly been the latter kind, I suppose, with years of happy and painful moments alike to forge the bond. Dearest Arthur was always in my heart, and I am glad to find there is still room for me in his. For he has told me that he has come to love me—not as a friend, but as something more.
Neither of us will ever forget Mariah, even in our love. Because of her willingness to hear God’s counsel, there were no more stones added to the northern part of the cemetery to bear that awful sign of plague. We have reason every day to be grateful that she led us to the source of our suffering.
Some people—those who still believe there was a curse at work among us—say we must find a new burial ground. They feel trouble may come to those who set foot on the resting place of a plague victim. I can only sigh and shake my head for such talk, since I suffer nothing but bittersweet memories when I carry flowers there every week for those who rest there. But others—rightly so—argue there is so little room left in the cemetery that only a few graves can join those we loved and lost.
Perhaps a time will come when less talk is made of the curse, and more about God’s way of showing us what really happened, if we will remember that a careless prank on a night for making mischief led to a very real kind of terror. Even with proof, though, some will never believe. But I will always know and be thankful.
It was the last entry in a journal that had only one more piece of the past to offer. A folded newspaper clipping from the Woolwich County Times was slid inside the book’s trough. Its edges crumbled as Jenna unfolded it to read the headline: ”Farmer’s Bull Found in Spring after Mischief Night Fun.”.
