The Last, Long Night

by Ginny Dye

  Carrie nodded briskly and pushed past him.

  Pastor Anthony managed a very weak smile. “I guess you were right.”

  “I’d rather not be right,” Carrie said gently, alarmed by the bright flush on his face and his rapid breathing. “Are you hurting anywhere?”

  “My chest,” Pastor Anthony whispered weakly. “The pain has been coming and going for a while, but this time it’s really bad.”

  “You’ve been hurting like this for a while?” Carrie gasped. “Why…?”

  Pastor Anthony held up his hand to stop her. “You don’t have to tell me I was unwise…” His words broke off when he gasped. His face whitened as a new wave of pain swept through him, and then he fell back against the pillows gasping for breath.

  “Carrie…”

  Carrie shook her head at Jeremy. “Not now. Give me my bag.” She pulled out the stethoscope, held it to Pastor Anthony’s chest and listened carefully, trying to hide her grave concern for Jeremy’s sake.

  She turned to Bella and was glad she had thought to bring her. “Bathe his face with cool water. If he wants water, give it to him. Do not let him move out of this bed.” She stared down at her patient and then turned back to Bella. “Do you think you can do that? He can be rather stubborn,” she said ruefully.

  “You leave him to me, Miss Carrie. That man only gonna be movin’ over my dead body!”

  Carrie’s lips turned into a quirk of a smile before she motioned to Jeremy and led him outside the house to the street.

  “It’s bad,” Jeremy said quietly.

  Carrie nodded grimly. “It’s his heart.”

  “Can you do anything?”

  “I will try, but he may have waited too long,” she admitted heavily, berating herself that she had let this happen.

  Jeremy read her thoughts. “It’s not your fault, Carrie. I tried to get him to tell you he wasn’t feeling good, but he refused. You know how stubborn he can be. He even hid it from me most of the time. He made me promise not to say anything. I was afraid refusing would create even more stress.”

  Carrie did indeed know about Pastor Anthony’s demanded promises. Her mind turned to solutions. “I’ll mix up a solution of Lily of the Valley. It strengthens the heart, but it’s also important he not get too much. I’ll teach Bella how to give it to him. No one but her is to administer it,” she ordered. “Is that clear?”

  “Certainly,” Jeremy agreed, “but isn’t there something I can do?”

  Carrie hesitated and gazed at him.

  “It’s that bad?” Jeremy said heavily.

  Carrie knew the truth was best. “I’m sorry. His heart is in very bad condition. I will do all I can, but I think the best thing you can do for your father is keep him quiet and spend as much time with him as you can.”

  “Visitors?”

  “Only one at a time and only a few a day. Not seeing his people will only cause him more distress.” She didn’t add that it would be their chance to tell him goodbye. Her voice softened as she saw the misery in Jeremy’s eyes. “God still works miracles,” she said gently. “I see them every day. If anyone deserves a miracle, it is your father.”

  Jeremy forced a smile and then moved back toward the house. “I’ll tell Bella you’ll be back soon with the Lily of the Valley mixture.”

  Neither Spencer nor Carrie said a word as the carriage moved through the night toward the house. Alone with her thoughts, Carrie could admit how damaged Pastor Anthony’s heart was. The long hours… the skipped meals… the burden of caring for his congregation. It had all taken its toll on his tender, giving heart.

  Tears blurred Carrie’s vision as she leaned her head back against the carriage seat.

  All she could do was try…

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Perry Appleton, you are not going to fight again! I simply won’t have it.” Tears filled Louisa’s blue eyes as she took her stance in front of the door to their white clapboard house, her blond hair lit like a halo by the sun streaming through the windows. She looked every bit like an avenging angel. “You’re all I have left,” she gasped. “You’re all I have left…”

  Louisa could hardly breathe as pain ripped through her heart. She had lost her home, her father, her beloved brother. And now her mother, an empty shell of her former vibrant self, lay wasting away in a bedroom upstairs. Louisa had fought not to give up on life, not to give in to bitterness; her love for Perry, along with his love for her, had saved her.

  She gripped his hands as she pleaded. “Don’t you understand? I love you so much. I simply can’t lose you. I just can’t…”

  Perry gazed down at her with deep love in his eyes that were as vividly blue as hers. His dark blond hair curled just above his collar. He gripped her hands tightly. “Louisa, I have to go. The Yankees will take Atlanta.”

  “They can have this old city,” Louisa cried. “They can have every building, every round of ammunition, every morsel of food. They cannot have my husband!”

  Her protests were drowned out by more mortars falling into the city. Explosions rocked the house, but still she refused to move.

  “And your mother?” Perry asked, still trying to be reasonable. “Will you just allow the Yankees to blow the house up?”

  “Putting yourself out there to be killed is not going to stop the Yankees,” Louisa argued, knowing she was right. “You know that as well as I do. It’s only a matter of time before they take Atlanta,” she yelled over the noise. “I’m just sorry we left the farm and came here.” Images of their charming little farm tucked away in a mountain valley danced before her eyes. For all she knew, it was already destroyed.

  Perry and Louisa had joined the thousands who had streamed into Atlanta looking for refuge. But because it was not safe to move her mother again, they had not followed the thousands who had then fled the city when it offered no safety. Atlanta had become a city under constant bombardment.

  Perry stared down at the floor. “I thought you and your mother would be safer here,” he muttered.

  “Of course, you did. Both of us did,” Louisa said instantly, raising his head with her hand to meet his eyes. “And we will be fine here - as long as you don’t go off to fight.” Her voice became defiant again. “I won’t hear of it.” She stopped short of ridiculing his desire to go back to battle with only one leg. Every man had a right to his pride. Even though Perry was quite adept with his wooden stump, there were limits.

  She stepped closer and laid her head on his chest. “Please don’t leave me. I need you. Our baby and I need you.” She knew she was fighting dirty when she put her hand over her newly swelling stomach, but she also knew she would do anything to keep him home. “If something were to happen, how would I get Mama out of here? How will I take care of our baby?”

  “But all the men are fighting!”

  Louisa hid her smile. She knew she was winning this battle. He was still protesting, but his protestations had lost all their fire. “Then let them fight. You have paid all you’re going to pay for this war. You gave them your leg; you will not give them your life.” She could tell the instant he gave in by the look of relief on his face.

  She and her husband never talked about the horrid nightmares that covered him with soaking sweat every night. She never told him how many nights she went without sleep and stroked his head so he could rest. Perry never acknowledged ,and she never pressed him to talk about, the pain that still gripped him from his injury.

  Carrie Borden, her childhood friend, had saved Perry’s life and then allowed her to care for him until they could marry. Louisa’s love for Perry had saved her. She hid her sigh of relief as she led him into the kitchen for a glass of water. Now that he had given up the insane idea of fighting she wanted to know more.

  “What is Sherman doing now?” she asked calmly.

  ‘I was wondering how long it would take for one ugly red-headed journalist to make it down to the real action!”

  Matthew laughed as he settled down next to Peter. �
��They sent me down to Petersburg for a few days but decided the same news about a stalemate wouldn’t be flattering for Lincoln. They sent me down here, hoping something more promising would happen.”

  “How is the siege of Petersburg going?” Peter asked, taking a gulp of water from his canteen as he cooked bacon over the fire. The end of August in Georgia was brutally hot.

  “I wouldn’t call it a siege,” Matthew said. “Petersburg is not surrounded, and its supply lines aren’t cut off. The Confederates are still getting supplies in from the Shenandoah Valley through Richmond. They’re hurting, but they’re still very much alive.”

  “Must be driving General Lee almost mad,” Peter said with a smirk. “He’s used to calling the shots, but now his army has nowhere to go and no way to maneuver. I wonder whether he knows it’s just a matter of time.”

  “If he knows it, he’ll never admit it,” Matthew observed. “As long as there is one chance in a million, the man will fight. It’s in his genes.”

  “So what’s happening there?”

  “Oh, Grant is trying to breach Lee’s entrenchments,” Matthew said wryly. “He’s having about as much success as he’s had all summer. So now he’s digging his own. They just keep getting longer.” He shrugged. “It’s not a bad plan, and it will wear out the Confederacy in time, but I know it’s not the glorious victory Grant hoped for.”

  “He’s Commander-in-Chief of the Union forces,” Peter replied. “He’ll have a glorious victory to report soon. You were about to miss all the excitement.”

  “Yeah? What’s happening down here?”

  “Well, from the looks of things, both armies are lying still just like two savage dogs watching one another to see how and where the other will attack.”

  “From the looks of things?”

  “Yeah,” Peter said with a grin. “Everything looks the same from the Rebels’ view, but they’re not seeing a big chunk of this army that has moved way back and is circling around to cut the railroad around Macon. Sherman has most of his army on the move.”

  Matthew whistled. “That will completely cut off the Confederacy’s transportation link and all their supplies.”

  Peter nodded. “Yep. It’s just a matter of time.”

  “So everyone is just sitting here?”

  “Oh, they’re making the Rebels think we might still attack at any time.”

  Just then a mortar whistled overhead. Matthew threw himself onto the ground and heard the whistle as it passed overhead. He heard it explode about a hundred feet away and looked up to see the smoldering remains of a tree. What astonished him the most, though, was to see Peter still lounging in his chair and laughing at him.

  “You think that’s funny?” Matthew sputtered. “We both could have been killed! Does that go on all the time?”

  “Pretty much,” Peter said easily. “We’ve learned how to read the music. That wasn’t one to worry about.”

  Matthew stared at him, wondering if the strain of the war had finally made his friend lose his mind. “Read the music?”

  Peter laughed harder, then took a breath, and explained. “We have been hearing those shells ever since we got here. I finally figured out the whistle of the shells vary through an entire octave. If it’s traveling very fast, it sounds in a high key. If it heads our way more slowly, then it gives you a bass note. Listen to it tonight – you’ll hear a whole tune from do to rah, with sharps and flats now and then.”

  “Fascinating,” Matthew muttered, certain Peter had finally lost it. “And this is important why?”

  Peter grinned. “That shell that just went over was playing on the higher notes. I knew it would pass right over us. It’s the ones that strike a bass note that you have to worry about. That means it’s going to fall short, or land right among us.”

  “What do you do if you hear the bass?” Matthew asked.

  “Pray.”

  Matthew looked at him and managed a smile. “I believe I’ll start praying now that I hear only high notes.”

  “That would be good,” Peter said calmly. “The bacon is ready. Want some?”

  Matthew looked around as they ate. “Everyone seems pretty relaxed.”

  “They are. They’ve had two pitched battles that produced casualties for both sides, but for the most part everyone is just sitting around while they lob shells at each other.” He gave a deep sigh. “Oh, some of the shells do their job. We’ve lost more men than I care to think about, but you learn how to block it out and just live.” His eyes said the strain was getting to him, but the smile on his face said he wouldn’t give in to the fear.

  Matthew decided to change the subject. “How did the battles go?”

  “The Confederates lost heavily each time. Sure, we lost our share, but it’s nothing like what went on up at Richmond.”

  “I hope to God not,” Matthew muttered.

  “It was a long three month campaign for these soldiers,” Peter continued. “They did a lot of marching. They’re pretty happy to just be in camp for a while. They need a rest.”

  “You’re sure Atlanta will be taken?”

  “Hood isn’t Lee,” Peter said simply. “And Sherman is nobody’s fool. I predict the city will fall within the next couple days. You can’t tell it by looking around, but when that railroad is cut, Hood won’t have much of a choice. He’ll have to surrender or leave.”

  “You sure you want to go out there?”

  Matthew stared out at the picket lines and then looked over at the soldier, still a teenager, carrying his rifle and a smug grin. He knew his editors would love a story from the trenches surrounding Atlanta, but he could admit to second thoughts.

  “It ain’t that bad, Mr. Justin.”

  “What’s your name?” It wouldn’t hurt to ask some questions while he was making up his mind whether he wanted to risk his life again for a story.

  “Brady Kremer. I’m from up in Maine.”

  “How you handling the heat down here?” Matthew asked, grinning.

  “Let’s just say that once I get back to my daddy’s boat up in Maine, I don’t intend to ever spend another second in the South.”

  Matthew laughed. “The summers are brutal,” he agreed, feeling suddenly embarrassed that a pimple-faced kid was telling him he didn’t have to be afraid. Fear or not, he still had a healthy ego. Nodding toward the pits, he said, “You ready?”

  Brady grinned. “Keep real low and jump into the pit right behind me. We wait until night so we won’t be such a good target. But there can’t be more than twenty feet or so between us and the Rebel pits. You want to move real fast.”

  Matthew was glad Brady couldn’t see his face go white. Twenty feet?

  “Move!” Brady said quietly as he leaned over and dashed through the darkness.

  Matthew was right behind him and dropped instantly into the same pit he saw Brady disappear into. He started to take a breath of relief until he felt himself sucked into mud and water up to his thighs, which made him crouch at his waist to keep his head below the edge of the pit. “What in the…?”

  “Shhh…” one of the soldiers cautioned him. “Won’t be too good if you give away our position. We can talk down here, but we find it works best if we just whisper. You’re more likely to stay alive that way.”

  “Do you always stand in a lake?” Matthew whispered back, glad that at least the water was warm.

  Brady chuckled quietly. “We’ve had some rain,” he admitted. “It ain’t got nowhere to go because of all this good red Georgia clay, so it just fills up our pits.”

  Matthew stared around at the five men sharing his pit. “You can’t stand up. You can’t sit down. What do you do?”

  “We scrunch,” Brady offered. “It ain’t the most comfortable thing, but it’s better than getting shot.”

  Matthew decided getting a story would take his mind off how uncomfortable he was. Whispering, he asked the nearest soldier, “What’s your name?”

  “Paul Maltz.” Anticipating Matthew’s next qu
estions he added, “I’m from a small town up in Vermont. I have a small maple syrup farm up there. I signed up at the beginning of the war.”

  “You re-enlisted in June?”

  “Yep. I’ve stayed alive this long. I figure I want to be a part of it ending,” he said, his voice confident. “Me and the boys don’t figure it can last much longer; especially with General Sherman and Grant running things.” The soldier stared out into the darkness and then turned back to Matthew. “The last three months have been real rough, but we’ve done what we set out to do.”

  “How do you feel about slavery?” Matthew asked, suddenly deciding to take the story in a different direction.

  “Slavery?”

  Matthew could tell the question puzzled the soldier. “The slaves will all be freed when the war is over if the Union wins. You’re serving in an army with over one hundred thousand black soldiers. Does that play a role in how you think about the war?”

  Paul shrugged. “I can’t say it does. I never thought much about slavery because we never owned any and I never knew anyone who did. We always did what needed doing ourselves. I joined up at the beginning of the war because I believe in the United States of America. My granddaddy was just a boy during the Revolution. He lost his father and his brother. I figure if having the country was worth fighting for, that it only made sense to keep it.”

  Everyone jerked to attention when a spatter of gunfire kicked up the dirt around their pit, but then they relaxed when quiet returned. Matthew could tell the men were used to it, so he focused on hiding his fear by keeping his breathing steady.

  “Slavery?” Paul continued. “It’s not why I started to fight, but I suppose everyone deserves to be free. The black soldiers I’ve been fighting with are good soldiers. I’ve heard all those arguments about blacks being less than whites, and not being able to take care of themselves without white people. I figure that’s just a bunch of hogwash.”