Three Books in One: A Covenant of Love, Gate of His Enemies, and Where Honor Dwells

by Gilbert, Morris

  CHAPTER 5

  EPIDEMIC

  When Pat and Tyler enlisted in the army, it brought the grim reality of war home to the Rocklins and the Steeles in a way nothing else had. Of course, both families had been caught up in the events of the times—the Steeles in the abolition movement, the Rocklins in the military—but with the departure of the young men, life changed for all of them. For Rev. Amos Steele, his son’s absence was a continual reminder that he had failed as a father, at least in his own mind. Steele was an honest man, and when he faced up to the fact that he had neglected his family, he admitted it to his wife, Laura.

  “If he dies in battle, Laura,” he said in a strained voice, “I’ll never know a moment’s peace!” She had tried to comfort him, telling him that he had given much to his family. He just brushed her off, saying bitterly, “Don’t try to make excuses for me! As a minister of the gospel, I, of all men, should have been a good father. And I will be, Laura, the best I can, but the children are all grown. Pat is twenty-one, Colin is twenty, and Clint is eighteen. And Deborah may be only nineteen, but she is a grown woman.”

  “It’s not too late, Amos,” Laura insisted. She came to stand before him, putting her arms around him and lifting her face to kiss him. “You have love in you. You’ve always been afraid to show it.”

  “Not to you.”

  “No, dear,” she said with a smile. “Not when we’re alone. But even with me you’re afraid to show affection in public.”

  Staring at her, Amos said slowly, “My family was never demonstrative. I don’t ever remember seeing my father kiss my mother. Even now none of my brothers and sisters show emotion. I was taught such things were a weakness.” Then he shook his head, adding almost angrily, “Well, those who taught me that are wrong! And with God’s help, I’ll give more of myself to the children from now on!”

  “Now don’t go falling all over them!” Laura warned, a light of pride in her eyes. She had yearned for years to see this stern husband of hers break out of his rigid mold. “You’ll scare them to death.”

  “Well then, I’ll just practice up on you!” Steele pulled her to him and kissed her so forcibly that she could scarcely catch her breath. When he released her, she laughed at him. “Now remember, I’m an old married woman, Amos!”

  “You’re a child!” he said, and from that moment—though he wasn’t sure just why—he found it easier to be more expressive in his relationships with his children. He spent much of his time with Clinton, taking him fishing, something they both loved. The lad was strong and agile, and Amos loved watching him. By the time the two of them had been together on two trips, he had opened up to his father in a way he never had before.

  As welcome as this was, it was a sorrow for Steele, for the thing Clint shared with his father was that he wanted nothing so much as to be a soldier. He had finally come out with this as they were wading a trout stream. The swift water bubbled over their feet, and their creels were full of fish.

  “Pa, I want to be a soldier,” Clint had said without preamble. It had been on his mind for years, but he had not dared to mention it to anyone.

  Steele had restrained the impulse to flatly squash the notion, which was what he would have done not long ago. Instead he laid the fly line down on the water with an expert motion, then, getting no strike, said as easily as he could, “Because of Pat’s decision to enlist?”

  “No, sir. I’ve always wanted to be a soldier. Like Uncle Gideon, in the Regular Army.”

  “It’s a hard life, son.”

  “I know it is, but it’s all I want.” Clint’s square face was set as he added, “I want to go to West Point. For a long time I’ve wanted to ask you to try to get me an appointment.” At that moment, a trout took Clint’s fly. For the next few moments he played the fish expertly, his face alive with pleasure. He removed the fish, admiring the red and gold stipples on its sides, then slipped it into the creel at his side and turned to face his father. “Will you do it?”

  Amos Steele stood there, everything in him longing to deny the boy’s request. He hated the world of the military, or at least what it stood for in its ultimate purpose, which was to destroy an enemy. Yet the past few days had brought changes to him, and he knew that he had no choice. Slowly he nodded. “If it’s what you really want, Clint, I’ll try to get you an appointment.”

  Clint Steele stood transfixed for a few moments, staring at his father’s face. Then he suddenly splashed through the knee-deep water and threw his arms around his father. Holding on to him tightly, he gasped, “Oh, Pa! Pa!”

  Tears rose in Steele’s eyes as, for the first time since his son was a child, he held him in his arms. And it took a war to teach me how much this means! he thought bitterly. Then he slapped Clinton on the back, saying, “Well, we’ll have to tell your mother—and your uncle Gid, too. I expect he’ll like it better than she will!”

  The two of them went that afternoon to see Gideon, who received the news with less surprise than they had expected. “You’ve always been fascinated by the army, Clint.” He smiled at the boy. “You’ve read everything there is, I guess, about the service, and sometimes you’ve pestered me to death with your questions. I thought it might come to this.”

  “Can you get me into West Point, Uncle Gideon?” Clint asked eagerly.

  “Well, that takes a congressional appointment, and I’m just a lowly Major. But I’ll work on it. You’ve got a little time to wait.” Smiling at Clint, he said, “Maybe you’ll change your mind and decide to become an actor.”

  “Oh no!” Clint said, shocked by the very idea.

  Gid laughed, then turned to Amos. “Tell you what, Amos. You bring your whole brood over to our house for supper tonight. Clint can make his big announcement about his plans to become a general to all the family.”

  “I wish Pat could come,” Clint said. “But I guess he can’t get away.”

  “Well now, that’s one of the advantages of having an uncle who’s a Major,” Gid said. Then he added with a sly glance at Steele, “But if you’d really like Pat to come, you might have Deborah ask Colonel Bradford. I think he’s about ready to do whatever she asks.”

  “I’d rather you did it, Gideon,” Steele said at once. He did not amplify his remark, but the soldier understood.

  “Of course, Amos. I’ll bring him along.”

  The Rocklin home was not as large or as expensively furnished as the Steeles’ home, for a soldier had to be ready to move at a moment’s notice. But the old brownstone, located just off Pennsylvania Avenue, was large and fairly comfortable. After the cramped, miserable quarters that Melanie and Gideon had occupied at Fort Swift in the Dakota Territory, the house seemed a palace!

  Melanie and Laura, with some help from Deborah, worked on the meal, running into each other at times in the small kitchen. Meanwhile, the men sat in the parlor and talked. When the pot roast was done, Melanie said, “Well, the food’s ready, so let’s see if we can sandwich ourselves into the dining room.”

  They all crowded into the dining room, a cheerful space with yellow wallpaper and a large bay window that admitted a slight breeze and bars of yellow sunlight. The six Steeles and four Rocklins squeezed themselves into place. “We can’t eat much, that’s for sure,” Clint piped up, pinched between Pat and Colin. “All squoze up like this, there’s not much room for food!”

  “That’s right, Clint,” Gid said, grinning. “Part of our strategy to live on a lowly soldier’s pay! Squeeze ‘em in so tight they can’t hold much grub!”

  “Well, it won’t work with me, sir!” Pat said at once. “I’ve missed home cooking so much, just don’t anyone get his hand too close to my plate or he’s likely to draw back a stub!”

  “Ask the blessing, will you, Amos?” Gid said.

  “Oh God, we thank Thee for the food, which is Your provision. But we thank Thee even more for each other, for our family. You set the solitary in families, and we ask Your protection on every member of this family.” Steele hesitated slightly,
then added, “And we ask Your protection and blessing on our family at Gracefield, on the grandparents, the parents, and the young ones there. In Jesus’ name, I ask it.”

  “I’m glad you did that, Amos,” Melanie said as they began to fill their plates. “We need to remember Thomas and Susanna. I miss them so much, and now it looks as though we may not see them for a long time.”

  “Father says Thomas isn’t well,” Gid remarked, carving the roast with a long knife and laying neat slices on the plates that came to him. “He said that if Clay hadn’t come back when he did, Gracefield would have been lost. Clay took all the money he made while he was gone and paid the notes off.”

  Deborah took a bite of fresh biscuit, then said slowly, “It’s strange, isn’t it? Clay made all that money in the slave trade and it saved the family home. Now he hates slavery, and everybody there is angry at him because he won’t enlist in the army so that slavery can be preserved. It must be hard on him.”

  “I’m very proud of Clay,” Gid said warmly. “He started out making such a wreck out of his life, but he’s come back and done all he can to put things right. Not many men can do that, and it’s sad that some people in his world don’t seem to realize it.”

  As the meal went on, they talked across the table, enjoying the food and the company. When Amos asked about Tyler, Gideon shrugged. “He likes it very well in the New York Zouaves. Since Virginia seceded, the president sent eight regiments across the Potomac to seize Alexandria and Arlington Heights. Colonel Ellsworth’s Zouaves were part of that force.”

  “That’s really the beginning, isn’t it?” Robert asked. At nineteen, he was more like his mother, Melanie, than his father. Always a quiet boy, he had grown up to be a studious young man, thoughtful and curious about everything. “It’s the first invasion of the South, isn’t it, Father?”

  “Yes, it is, Rob,” Gideon said, and a sadness touched his dark eyes. “It won’t be the last, though.” Then he shook his head and said with a smile, “Well, what about your announcement, Clint?”

  Clint stammered, “Well … I’m—I’m going to be an offic—uh, in the army. Father has agreed, and Uncle Gideon’s going to get me an appointment to West Point!”

  His announcement brought cries of surprise from everyone. Pat grinned at him, saying, “Well, you son of a gun! I’ll be taking orders from my own brother!”

  “Not for a while, Pat,” Clint said, pleased with the attention. “I can’t get into the Point for a while. By the time I get out, the war will be over.”

  After the meal, they were all drinking coffee when Pat suddenly snapped his fingers. “Hey, I almost forgot! I have a message for you, Deborah—from one of your admirers.”

  “Must be Colonel Bradford,” Amos grunted. “He’s been at the house twice.”

  “No, the colonel doesn’t send messages by lowly privates,” Pat said, grinning. “But it’s right handy having the commanding officer stuck on your sister! Makes you kind of special.”

  “Bet you wish Captain Frost was in love with Deborah, don’t you, Pat?” Gid said with a slight smile. “You’d never have to dig a ditch!”

  Deborah sniffed. “Oh, don’t be silly! A message from whom, Pat?”

  “Noel Kojak. He said to tell you thanks for the help you sent to his mother.”

  “What’s that?” Amos asked, surprised, and Deborah flushed. She explained, “Oh, I encouraged the young man to enlist, so I’m helping his mother a little until his enlistment is up.” Wanting to change the subject, she asked, “Is he a good soldier, Pat?”

  “Better than I am, for sure!” Pat grinned ruefully. “Matter of fact, he’s the best in the platoon. Always up first and keeps his equipment polished and clean. Never makes sick call.” He scowled at Deborah, saying, “You might tell him he could make life a little easier on the rest of us if he’d mess up once in a while!”

  “The working class makes the best soldiers,” Gid said. “They’ve had hard lives, so soldiering is easy. Spoiled characters, like Pat here, have to get weaned from Mama before they can function as troopers. The same in the South. The farm boys like the army because they have better clothes, more fun, and less work than they’ve ever had in their lives.”

  “Well, Noel is in trouble enough with some of the fellas in the platoon,” Pat said. “Mostly because he insists on letting his religion show.”

  “How’s that, Pat?” Amos Steele asked at once, his eyes alert.

  “Oh, Noel reads his Bible all the time, it seems like, and every night he gets down on his knees and prays.”

  “And you don’t, Pat?” It was his mother who asked the question, and Pat was embarrassed.

  “Well, I can pray just as well in bed, Mother. When a fellow shows too much religion, it makes the men think he’s showing off.” The conversation bothered Pat, and he changed the subject. “By the way, Deborah, Noel told me something else. He said his family’s down with the flu, and he wants you to pray for them.”

  “Bad epidemic,” Gid stated. “We’ve been blessed, but quite a few of the men have been down, and Father tells me many of his men and their families are in bad shape.”

  The evening ended soon, but Deborah did not join in much of the talk. On the way home, Clint said, “You’re worried about this fellow’s family, aren’t you, Deb?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Well, you’ll have to do what he asks,” Clint said practically. “You’ll have to pray for them.”

  Deborah did pray that night after she went to bed, but by the time she went to sleep, she knew that prayer wasn’t going to be enough. She dropped off to sleep, a plan hatching in her mind. That night it was only a vague notion, but by morning it was fully developed.

  The Swampoodle district announced itself to Deborah first by the almost overpowering stench that issued from the hundreds of ramshackle privies behind the crude shanties. It had rained during the night, and the moist air seemed heavy with the rank odor.

  The visual impact of the area offended the eyes almost as much as the smell offended the nose. There was no trace of beauty to be found, not anywhere. Line after line of shacks, unpainted and scoured to a leprous gray-brown by wind and weather, met Deborah’s gaze. Drying clothes hung from a crisscross of lines and billowed in the breeze, but the clothing had no more color than the shacks. There was no attempt at decoration, no flowers or fresh curtains—all was crude, plain, and depressing.

  Deborah drove her buggy down the muddy streets, doing her best to miss the pigs and chickens, most of which were as scrawny and lean as specters, that were crossing in front of her. The children who watched her pass stared at her, eyes large in their thin faces. They seemed to have been born exhausted, too tired to play as children should.

  A trio of men leaning against a stark building with the single word Saloon over the door looked up as she approached. Deborah resisted the impulse to whip the horse up, and when one of them leered at her, saying, “Hello, girlie. How about a little drink?” she did not even look at him. The man made a coarse remark as she moved on, her heart beating rapidly, but he did not follow.

  A small general store at an intersection drew her attention. She got down, hitched the horse to a rickety rail, then walked to the board sidewalk. Stepping inside, she blinked to adjust her eyes to the gloomy darkness. A single room with an assortment of cans on shelves made of rough lumber, and barrels of pickles and crackers on the floor, met her gaze.

  “Help you?” Deborah turned quickly to face a short, fat man who was smoking a cigar. It had burned down so far that the ruby glow seemed to touch his lips. He was sitting on a cane-backed chair and made no move to get up.

  “I’m looking for a family named Kojak,” she answered.

  The man studied her, then removed the cigar and studied it. “Which one?”

  “Oh, why, I don’t—”

  “Three Kojaks I know of around here.”

  “The one with a son named Noel. He’s in the army.”

  “Yeah, well—that’s
Will.” Replacing the cigar between his lips, the owner drew on it, and in the gloom the glowing end made a vivid period under his stubby nose. “What’cha want with ‘em?”

  Deborah stared at him, stopped dead still by his abrupt question. “I have something for Mrs. Kojak,” she said.

  “Down this street five blocks, then go right for two blocks. Ask some of the kids you see where Will Kojak lives.”

  Deborah said, “Thank you,” but as she turned to leave, an idea came to her. “I’d like a few groceries.” The man got to his feet quickly, his eyes brightening. His stock was pitifully small, and Deborah cut that by a full quarter before she was through. He found an old box, packed it with tins of canned food, then stuffed fresh vegetables into old newspapers. He had some hard candy, and she took a large sampling of that, as well as some staples of flour, sugar, and coffee.

  “Comes to nine dollars and sixty-six cents,” the thickset man said, looking at her fearfully, as if afraid that the price might overwhelm her.

  Deborah counted out the money, and he poked it into his vest pocket with aplomb, then said, “Lemme put this in your buggy, ma’am.” When the goods were loaded and she got into the buggy, he lifted his hat, saying cheerfully, “Top o’ the morning to you, miss!”

  Deborah smiled at him. “Thank you,” she said, then made her way down the street. As she followed his directions, she thought of how a few dollars had made the man civil. It wasn’t just the money, she felt, although she was sure that her order had been a large one for the owner. The sale had brought cheer and hope into the man’s countenance, and it somehow shamed her that she had come to think so little of the abundance she’d lived in all her life.

  The section she came to was, if possible, even worse than the collections of shanties she had passed already, but she pressed on. A group of children, none over seven or eight, stood watching her listlessly. When she pulled up and asked, “Do you know where Will Kojak lives?” none of them answered. Finally one of them pointed to one of the shacks and piped up, “Right there.”