The knock came again. Not sure what else she should do, she called out, “Yes?”
“I am Doctor Hall. I was asked to come to this room?”
“Oh, yes, Doctor, please do come in.”
Annabelle ran a hand over the front of her dress in a vain attempt to smooth the wrinkled fabric as the door opened. An older man entered the room, carrying a large black bag. This was not the local doctor who had visited Rosswood when her father’s new wife had grown gravely ill. That was a wondrous stroke of luck.
He stepped across the room, his black shoes thudding on the floor. “Hello. Are you Miss Smith?”
“Yes.”
He studied her as she studied his white hair, bushy brows, and the air of a man who had discovered that weariness could seep all the way down into the soul. He stepped forward and bent to one knee, opening his black bag and digging around.
He looked up and extended his hand. “Foot, please, ma’am.” Annabelle complied and lifted her leg, and as he took hold of her ankle she winced.
The doctor bent close and examined the tender flesh. “Some swelling, but little bruising. When did the injury occur?”
“Earlier this morning.”
He did not ask how it had happened, and she did not offer any more information. Instead, she shifted the topic to slaking her curiosity. “You are not the local doctor, are you?”
“I am not.” He bent her foot up toward her leg. “Does this hurt?”
“Not so much. Then who are you?”
“I am Doctor Hall.”
“As you said. But, where did you come…?”
He turned her foot inward, and she cried out in pain, losing the end of her question.
“As I suspected,” he said, ignoring her outburst and continuing to rotate her foot. Annabelle clenched the quilt underneath her and bit down on her lower lip. “You have strained one of your ligaments, but there’s not too much damage. It may hurt, but if you stay off it for a few days, you should be just fine. You can walk on it when necessary, but I would suggest you keep it elevated as much as possible until the pain subsides.”
She nodded. “Thank you, Doctor. How did you know to come see me?”
He lifted his brows and began closing up his bag. “You do not know?”
“A young private asked you?”
“Indeed. I am traveling with the unit. Now, if you will excuse me, I have patients I need to return to.”
Interesting. How had a private managed to get an army surgeon sent out to her aid? “What do I owe you for the service?”
“Nothing. Good day to you, ma’am.”
He put on his hat and ducked out the door before she could say anything more. With nothing else to do, Annabelle lay back on the bed and propped her foot up on the footboard, using the pillow as a cushion. She had nearly drifted off to sleep once more when another knock came at the door.
“Yes?”
“Supper, miss.”
Annabelle frowned. “Come in.”
The door opened, and a young girl, probably no more than twelve years of age, popped inside carrying a tray topped with a heaping plate of meat and vegetables and a glass of milk.
The girl looked around the sparse room, and then with a small shrug handed the tray to Annabelle. “Here. Hold this a second.”
Leaving the tray in Annabelle’s hands, the girl grabbed the room’s only chair and dragged it across the floor and up to where Annabelle sat on the bed. “Now, then,” she said. “We can put the tray on there, and that should work well enough, seeing as how we ain’t got a table.” The girl grinned, looking pleased with herself.
Annabelle couldn’t help but smile. “Thank you.” She placed the tray on the low chair in front of her. It might be a strange way to eat, but it was a blessing to have a meal.
“You’re welcome. I’ve never brought food up before. Most people just eat down in the main room with everyone else.” She shrugged. “Poppa said you had a hurt foot, so you were just going to eat up here.”
“That so?” How many people knew she was here? “How did your poppa know that?”
“The soldier told him when he paid for the room and for your meals. Poppa made him pay more than double, since he’s a Yank. Didn’t seem to bother him none.” The girl eyed her suspiciously. “He your beau?”
Annabelle shook her head.
The girl looked curious but said nothing more about it. “All right, then. Enjoy your supper.” She turned and went out of the room, pulling the door shut behind her. Left alone, Annabelle suddenly realized how ravenous she was, and she began shoveling ham, peas, and okra into her mouth much too quickly to be ladylike. It had been some time since she’d been given so much food.
The sun had begun to fade as she finished the meal, and without looking for a lamp or removing any of her clothing, Annabelle pushed the chair away from the bed and pulled the covers over her. Grateful for a safe room and a full stomach, she soon drifted off into a deep sleep.
“Every plan has failed. Now, perhaps, we may hope for the success of our movement, for it is only by that that the South can save herself.”
Matthew’s head pounded furiously. He groaned and rolled to his side in hopes of relieving a small measure of the pressure in the back of his skull. As he did, his stomach lurched and bile burned at the back of his throat. Drawing a long breath, he willed down the nausea that threatened to make him retch and forced his eyes open. With a few blinks, his vision cleared enough to reveal a small, sparse room with lamplight dancing across the unplastered walls.
Alarm swelled, and Matthew pushed himself up on one elbow on the quilt spread across the floor underneath him.
“Easy now,” said a voice from across the room. “You don’t want to move too much. You took a good blow there.”
Matthew trained his attention on the man as he stepped closer. How had he missed the presence of another in the room with him? He’d always been more aware of his situation. War had a way of teaching a man always to keep an eye out for his enemy. Matthew began to wonder how he was even still alive, given his foolishness. The man offered him a mug of tepid water, which he gratefully downed while studying the fellow from one eye.
He appeared to be middle-aged, portly, and dressed in a shopkeeper’s apron. Not seeming bothered by Matthew’s silent scrutiny, the man took the cup from him and crossed the room to place it on a low table near a sitting bench. “Sorry for making you lie on the floor,” he said, his back still turned, “but I’m afraid I don’t own a stick of furniture that would fit a man like you.”
Matthew gingerly pulled himself into a sitting position, hoping his stomach would stop tossing about like a ship on a windswept ocean. He stretched his legs out and adjusted himself so that his back rested against the wall behind him. As he settled, the pounding retreated somewhat.
“Who are you?” Matthew finally asked the stranger, once he’d determined that the water would remain in his stomach and not spew forth from his lips.
The shopkeeper sat on a low bench near the hearth, which was glowing with embers that barely chased the chill from the room. Twisting his hands in front of him, the man ignored his question. “I didn’t mean to hit you so hard, you know.” Apologetic concern etched the plains of his face. “You’re just such a big fellow and, well….” He shrugged.
Matthew frowned, the motion bringing another wave of pulsating pain. He rested his head against the wall but kept his focus on the man in front of him. “Why did you strike me?”
“There wasn’t time to explain, you see, and I didn’t think you would come with me otherwise.”
“You’re making no sense, man. Who are you, and what do you want with me?”
The man rose and began to pace. Matthew found that keeping his eyes on him proved difficult, so he let his lids droop. If the shopkeeper wanted to kill him, he would have done so already. It would be no more indignity than he’d already suffered in the course of this wretched day.
“I’m Edward Black. I own the gene
ral store.”
Worry constricted his chest, but Matthew kept his face impassive, leaving his eyes closed and speaking with an even tone. “And, what cause did you have to seek to disable me, Mr. Black?”
He heard Black cease his pacing and come to a stop in front of him. “I fear Miss Ross has landed herself in a dangerous situation, and I have a feeling you know something about it.”
Matthew cracked his eyes and had to tilt his head to look upon the man’s face, a position he was not accustomed to, nor did he appreciate. He pressed his lips into a thin line and waited for the man to continue, not trusting his words to remain civil.
Black sighed. “Please, believe I only meant to stun you, you see, just so you wouldn’t be able to hit me—or leave—until I had a chance to talk to you. Didn’t think I’d knock you out cold, I swear.” He scratched at the scruff growing on his chin. “Took three of us to get you up the stairs after those soldiers left.”
Matthew clenched his teeth, which renewed the throbbing in his head. Three more men had seen him. How long before someone handed him over as a deserter? Why had he ever agreed to any of O’Malley’s schemes? He wished he was still sitting on the line with his unit where he belonged, and not here on the floor, being scrutinized by some shopkeeper.
After four years of fighting bloody battles, he’d been taken down by a portly man in a blasted apron. Matthew tried to keep his frustration at bay, but it manifested itself in the clenching of his fists.
“I’m afraid you are poorly mistaken, sir,” Matthew said, the venom in his voice thinly veiled. “I do not know any woman by the name of Ross.”
“Don’t try to deceive me, young man. I know you are the deserter they are hunting. Can’t be too many men in this world who fit your description.”
His size had always seemed an asset. Now it appeared to be a disadvantage. He would stand out wherever he went. “I am not a deserter,” Matthew snapped.
The man lifted his hands and took a step back. “I don’t right care what you are and what you aren’t, mister. That’s your business. What concerns me is Miss Ross.”
“And, as I have told you, I do not know her.” The man began pacing again, and Matthew closed his eyes. “Do you suppose I could trouble you for something to eat?” Curse his pride at having to beg for food. Either he ate, or this confounding rolling in his stomach would reduce him to an even more pathetic state than he currently embodied.
The man stopped his heavy footsteps. “Of course. And then, you can tell me about the girl they said escaped with you.”
Matthew didn’t open his eyes as the footsteps retreated and the door closed. How had he come to this? Disabled, captured, and held prisoner by a portly man nearly twice his age. His brother would tease him for the rest of his days for such a thing. If he ever saw George again.
A few moments later the footfalls returned, and Matthew opened his eyes to find the shopkeeper offering an outstretched plate. His stomach growled as soon as the scent hit his nostrils. Matthew grunted his thanks and began to eat the cornbread without taking his eyes off Mr. Black. He quickly finished off the pile of peas, carrots, and slice of cold pork, but the meal seemed to do little more than further awaken his hunger. Still, at least it was something, and it quieted the sickness.
As soon as he placed his fork back on the plate, the man was there to take away the dish and set it aside. “Now,” he said eagerly, “tell me of the girl who escaped the camp.”
Matthew narrowed his eyes, the throb in his skull receding to a near-tolerable level. “What do you know of it?”
The man sighed, resting on his haunches in front of Matthew and thankfully situating himself at eye level. “Some soldiers came in saying a woman accused of being a spy escaped with a large man from the encampment north of town. Miss Ross was in my store just as they came in, looking a frightful mess. As soon as she saw them, she disappeared.”
Matthew nodded, but said nothing.
Mr. Black studied him for a moment, then seem resigned to continue. “Now, from what they say, they don’t know what is going on with the officer, since he had been an exemplary soldier up until that point. They said perhaps the officer was trying to capture and return the woman to their unit.” He eyed Matthew. “That, or he is a deserter.”
A thread of hope fluttered. Perhaps all was not lost. He could forget O’Malley’s schemes and that feisty little woman, and return to life as he’d known if for the past four years—bad water, long marches, sweat, and the companionship of men who’d shed blood together and survived to share glorious tales of battle with their sons.
Those men had become dear friends. They’d been with Matthew as he’d transitioned from a wayward youth to a man hardened by war, and they deserved his loyalty more than a pretty young spy, no matter how confounding and oddly enticing she might be. But, what of George? Who would seek his freedom if Matthew returned to the army and claimed to have chased but lost the girl?
The Yanks had long since stopped the prisoner exchange, and from what he’d heard tell, most men didn’t survive the harsh conditions in the prisons camps. If infection and gut rot didn’t bring them to ground, then starvation was a slow predator that would gnaw a man to his bones.
Mr. Black watched him but seemed patient enough to let Matthew think. He begrudgingly had to give the man credit for that.
He set his jaw. He had to get George out. Perhaps they had not been close in his youth, with George always being the serious and responsible type and Matthew finding a bit too much pleasure in cards, red-eye, and infuriating the fathers of nearly every pretty face in the county. But war had changed much of that. He was no longer the hot-blooded youth who had rushed to join the glory of battle, and through those hopeless times, he and George had learned much about one another. And now, George was all he had left. Regardless if this scheme got him imprisoned or hanged, he would see George freed and set over Westerly, where he belonged.
The shopkeeper cleared his throat, and Matthew realized he’d gone too long without answering. What had this little woman entangled herself in? Despite himself, his curiosity about her stilled him from giving up on her completely.
“Again,” Matthew said, “I do not know a Miss Ross. However, I do know of a Miss Smith, who appeared at the encampment wishing to deliver a message. As she did not have the proper call sign, she was escorted to the lieutenant colonel’s tent to discuss it with him. That is all I can tell you.”
The man lifted a brow. “Smith, huh? And did this Miss Smith have golden hair and bright blue eyes?”
It was Matthew’s turn to lift a brow. “Do you know her?”
“I know a Miss Ross, whose family lived just out from town, where they own a large plantation. Rosswood did well farming and brick making before the war. It’s mostly empty now – having been used as a hospital, and the slaves all running off – and now both of her parents are gone.”
Rosswood. He remembered the name, though he had not realized he had come this close to it. He had travelled there before, some years ago. What had it been? A ball? No. A wedding. A realization hit him, but he pushed it aside and focused on the shopkeeper.
Matthew shook his head. “They may have physical similarities, but I am afraid that this Miss Ross you seek cannot be the Miss Smith I encountered. Miss Smith is a working-class girl of no more than seventeen or eighteen years, despite her insistence she is nearly twenty.”
Black scratched at his chin again. “Well, Miss Ross always did look a bit young. I don’t recall her age exactly, but seems to me twenty is about right. Such a strange coincidence, though, since Smith was her mother’s name.” He studied Matthew intently. “You are certain this cannot be the same girl? I only wish to keep her from harm. I am afraid she is in great need of assistance.” He ran a hand over his head, signs of guilt creasing the corners of his eyes. “I should have stopped her when she came in here telling me she desperately needed to get a message out to her uncle. Ross’s second wife’s father—I don’t think he does
right by her. I don’t know much about it, but people talk. I fear something is quite wrong. I sent the telegram she requested and found someone to take that soldier home, but I should have tried to do more.”
Matthew tensed, sensing more to the man’s words than what was spoken. But he remained silent, and Mr. Black seemed to give up hope he would disclose any more. Finally, Mr. Black stood up and crossed the room to a trunk in the corner. He pulled out a worn blanket that was more wadded than folded. “You’re welcome to get your rest here tonight. I owe you that much for smashing your head.” He tossed the blanket, which Matthew caught with one hand.
“I thank you.”
Black regarded him another moment, something playing across his features that Matthew couldn’t quite place. Then it was gone, and the man offered a tense smile. “Goodnight to you, then.” He shut the door and left Matthew in deepening shadows.
Matthew’s brow creased, and he pulled out the memory that had earlier leapt into his mind. He remembered now. They had come for a wedding, then ridden on to Natchez that summer. Elliot Ross had married for a second time, a woman from lowly background but with a lovely face. Of course. How could he forget? He’d danced with the Tucker girl at that wedding and had set a fire to Marilia, the brunette he was courting at the time. She’d made quite a scene, and her father had to physically remove her from the lawn. Matthew had feared the man would try to run him through, but he’d seemed glad enough for his daughter to be finished with Matthew. He’d never called on her again.
Matthew tried to think back to that day. Yes, there had been a young girl there at the wedding. A shy thing who stayed always near to her father as he and the new bride mingled with their guests. Easy to dismiss. But, he did remember big, blue eyes….
Realization felt like a fist to the gut. No. It couldn’t be. Miss Smith could not possibly be Miss Ross, the girl his father had once mentioned as a match for him. Could she?
Rosswood was not too far from Westerly, and the Ross family was known for the quality of bricks they produced. Matthew’s father had suggested it would be a perfect match for their family, as lumber and brick yards were the new conquest Father sought, and the Ross daughter was not many years his junior.
The Liberator Series Box Set: Christian Historical Civil War Novels Page 13
