The Mirk and Midnight Hour

by Jane Nickerson

  I tried to answer them both. “They’re volunteers with the Army of Tennessee’s hospital division. That’s why I haven’t gone much lately, since they don’t really need me. But Michael told me that this week all the patients are to be moved by rail to Corinth. They think there might be a battle near Okolona soon, and that’s too close for comfort.”

  “Ha,” Dorian scoffed. “There’ll be no such thing.”

  “How do you know?” I asked.

  “I have my connections. Y’all may rest easy. The boom of cannon shall not rouse us from our beds anytime soon.” My cousin had a talent for imparting confidence; somehow we believed him. “By the way,” he added, “if any of you like books, I’ve a new French novel for you. Les Misérables. Just finished it. Everyone’s wild over it. Not for you, though, Seeley-the-squid. Stick to your innocent schoolboy reading about heads banging along on saddles.”

  After supper that evening we gathered in the sitting room. Dorian was gentle with Miss Elsa, seating her in the soft lamplight and fetching her needlework. For the masculine attention she rewarded him with smiles. He then set himself to teach Seeley how to use the bandalore, and before long Seeley relaxed further and could even do a few tricks, while Goblin batted at the spool with her black paw.

  “You know, of course,” Sunny said, tugging at a knot in her embroidery, “the child will drive us all daft with that thing before he’s through.”

  “A boy needs a bandalore,” Dorian said comfortably.

  “Thank you for helping him,” I whispered to my older cousin, so Seeley couldn’t hear.

  “See? I’m following your advice,” Dorian whispered back as he squatted beside my chair.

  “And it’s working. He’s much more at ease with you now.”

  “Anything to make you look at me approvingly, coz,” Dorian said, peeking up mischievously.

  I rolled my eyes and looked down at the sock I was knitting furiously to hide my blushes. As he kept watching me, I felt a silly, nervous grin stretch my lips.

  “When you smile so mysteriously,” Dorian said, “it makes me wonder what plots you’re hatching.”

  “None at all. I was wondering if this sock needs one more row before I cast off. All very boring.” I started on another row. “And you should be kind to people for their own sake, and not for anyone else’s approval,” I added severely.

  “I’ll try,” Dorian said, “if that will make you approve of me.”

  I snorted, and Sunny, who had been eyeing us vigilantly, immediately came to stand between us.

  “Dorian, would you help me with my necklace?” she asked. “The catch is stuck.” She smiled a little secret smile as she held up her curls above her long neck. He stood close behind, working on the clasp.

  Once he got it unhooked, Dorian settled himself to entertain, relating slightly scandalous and self-deprecatory stories of his recent dealings with high society in the Confederate capital of Richmond. With his bright hair and bronze skin, he glowed like one of the lamps. Miss Elsa quit feebly jabbing at her canvas and listened, entranced. From time to time she even commented on places she had also visited.

  “Have you actually seen President Jefferson Davis?” Sunny asked.

  “I have,” Dorian said. “And had a lengthy conversation with him. I could tell he was most impressed by me. I was crossing the road and Jeff Davis’s coach nearly ran me down. The great man himself poked his head out the window and said, ‘Watch yourself, young man. We can’t afford to lose Southern blood in such a way.’ Our president looked and sounded every bit the gentleman. A momentous meeting. I wouldn’t have minded being nearly run over by the president’s coach at all except that I got grease on my new sack coat and King had the devil of a time—oh, sorry for cursing, Miss Elsa—getting it out. Now that I think of it, maybe I should have left it stained as a conversation piece. My presidential grease spot.”

  Miss Elsa and Sunny shook with laughter and lavished him with admiring glances. My stepmother tapped him with her fan and fluttered her eyelashes. For a moment I saw a girlish Elsa, one who had been a sought-after belle. Dorian was certainly very different from the young men we knew around Chicataw, who only seemed to care for fighting, hunting, and chewing tobacco. Dorian was so polished—and he read books!

  “Meanwhile,” Sunny said, shaking her head, “the North has a rail-splitter for a leader. So hard to understand those people.”

  It was late when I finally deposited Seeley, Goblin, and Seeley’s cup of honey milk in bed. The cows would be anxious. I lit my lantern with an ember from the kitchen fire and headed out into the night.

  I jumped a little when Dorian emerged from the darkness and swung into step beside me in my circle of light.

  “ ‘Where are you going, my pretty maid?’ ” he said, quoting the old nursery rhyme.

  Without looking at him, I smiled. “ ‘I’m going a-milking, sir.’ ”

  “ ‘May I go with you, my pretty maid?’ ”

  “ ‘You’re kindly welcome, sir,’ ” I said.

  “Do you ever wonder why milkmaids are always so pretty?” Dorian asked.

  I unbarred the great barn door. “Obviously it’s so men will ask to go with them and rhymes can be written about them.”

  “Seriously, may I help you with your chores?”

  “If you like,” I said, but wished he wouldn’t. Besides the fact that his flirting made me uncomfortable, I preferred to be alone in the barn for the evening milking. It felt sheltered and intimate, with the soft sounds and warmth of the animals, the glow of the lantern, and the smell of hay. Another person spoiled it.

  Inside the doorway the pail hung on a nail just a little too high. As I stretched for it, Dorian stood close and reached over my head to lift it down. “Let me do that.”

  I turned around to find myself trapped in his arms. “My pretty maid,” he said softly, gazing down into my eyes. His were so blue. “I wonder … shall I make you fall in love with me?”

  “What makes you think you could?” I said into his chest, and tried to duck under his elbow.

  He lowered his arms and closed them tighter. “Oh, I’m not sure at all; that’s what would make it intriguing. When I see you smiling so mysteriously—”

  “Yes, you said that before,” I cut him off. His tone was too practiced. Too smooth. “To lots of girls, I bet. Does it usually do the trick?” I glanced up to see how annoyed he was by my words.

  At first he appeared taken aback, then delighted. He slapped his hand on his thigh and laughed. “You’d be surprised how well it usually works.”

  “Now,” I said, “stop being silly and let me get on with my chores. Sunny’s the one to work your charm on.”

  “Oh, Sunny …” He dismissed my beautiful stepsister with the flick of a hand. “Too easy by half.” With one finger he brushed back a strand of my hair that had escaped its pins. “Well, then, if you don’t want to be kissing cousins, why did you give me that come-to-me look?”

  “I—did—not—give you a look!” I shoved against him, not hard, but the post he was standing next to shook and some objects that were stored in the rafters banged down on us and clattered to the floor.

  Holding his head where a tin pail had hit, Dorian made a face and reached up to pick away the cobweb that now draped him. “You all right? That was quite the booby trap.”

  I began laughing so hard I could barely speak. “Sorry. The look on your—what a surprise! It’s all junk Pa put up there to fix later on. Naturally he never did anything about it.”

  Dorian chuckled as he bent to poke through things. “Huh. This is actually a pretty good saddle to be stuck away forgotten. And this old rifle.”

  “It’s broken. And there was something wrong with the saddle too. Lopsided or something. The pail has a leak. Pa can’t throw junk away.”

  Dorian replaced everything. “So—you think I’d better concentrate on Sunny?”

  “I do.”

  He nodded slowly and left me, as I had wished to be, alone
with my milking. Now, contrarily, I felt lonely. I leaned my head against Lily’s warm brown side and watched the milk spurt foaming into the pail.

  Amenze had said I would have a sweetheart soon. Except for Dorian and the patients in the courthouse hospital, there were no young men left for miles around.

  “Please.” The young man—the boy—caught at my skirt.

  “Here you go.” I removed a hunk of bread from my basket and held it out. I did not remember this fellow from the earlier times I had been at the hospital, probably because the patients had been more numerous before.

  He ever so slightly shook his head on the pillow. “No, miss, I’m not hungry. I only wanted to talk some. They’re cutting off my arm today.” Two red spots of fever glowed on his hollow cheeks.

  “Oh, dear.” I tried to control the dismay in my expression as I settled myself on a barrel beside his cot. “What a shame to have gone so long and have it taken off now.”

  His mouth twisted. “The rumor is that the Yanks poisoned their musket balls. That’s why we seem to be getting better for a while and then our wounds fester. The thing is … I know I’ll die because everyone who’s had limbs removed in this hospital has died.”

  For a moment I could not speak from the swelling in my throat. “Are you afraid?” I asked finally, softly.

  “No. I’ll go to a better place and I’m curious to see it. It’s only that I wish I could have seen my home and my family one more time.”

  “Tell me about them. And you.” I put my hand over his and clutched tightly.

  He was Mr. Isaac Lafarge, of Louisiana, and he was fifteen years old. He was the only son, with five older sisters. He had a coonhound named Badger.

  As it so often did when I was distressed, my amulet glowed warm and comforting against my skin. I lifted it from over my head and placed it around Mr. Lafarge’s neck. “Wear this until it’s all done,” I said. “The stone is supposed to bring luck.” I got his address and promised to write to his family.

  When the men arrived to take him to the surgeon’s table, I watched after, wondering if I should make myself go along.

  However, there was nothing more I could do for Mr. Lafarge, and there were others who needed care.

  During the past weeks, cots had been brought in so the patients were off the floor. Most of the filth had been cleaned up, and an army doctor and surgeon were in attendance, replacing Dr. Hale. Many of those patients I had attended were gone, either to their graves or removed by relatives. Although the men left here were mutilated in every imaginable way, several appeared quite cheerful now, certain they were on the mend. Others … Mr. Miller of Georgia, who had a dreadful wound to his shoulder, was wandering in his mind.

  Each time I came, my heart was struck anew by the horrors that the Yankees would work upon their fellow men.

  However, there was no time to think of such things. I offered water and food, bathed feverish faces and wounds. I listened to talk of “home, sweet home” and wrote letters. So little, yet the poor sufferers were grateful for it.

  A commotion sounded at the door. I looked up to see Dr. Abbot trying to shut out someone who was attempting to enter the gallery. “Oh, no you don’t,” Dr. Abbot’s voice boomed. “Today’s no different from those other times you came. We don’t want medicine such as yours here.”

  I caught a glimpse of a pink face with pebble-thick spectacles knocked askew as Dr. VanZeldt was shoved outside.

  “But you should want it.” The doctor’s raised voice beyond the slammed door sounded deeply distressed. “You simply do not know what I can do to help.”

  “Begone, sir, or you will be escorted bodily out of town.”

  This threat was met by silence. Dr. VanZeldt must have given up.

  By now Mr. Lafarge’s surgery was completed. I was ashamed of my cowardice in leaving him and went to his side as he slept. Gently I bathed his face. He had bitten through his lip; I washed the blood away.

  He was so still … so … empty.

  Cold.

  I reeled, shaky and sick.

  Rush. Oh, my Rush.

  No. Not Rush. This was Isaac Lafarge. I steadied myself against the edge of the bed and said a quick prayer for Isaac Lafarge. He was the darling of his mother and five sisters, yet I was the only one in the whole world who knew at this moment that he was dead.

  He no longer needed my amulet. After steeling myself to remove it from around his neck, I did so. The amber was cold. It had not been lucky for him.

  I informed a nurse about his passing.

  “Poor little Mr. Lafarge,” she said. “He was one of my favorites.”

  With the back of my hand I swiped at my cheeks. “Mine too,” I choked out.

  I stumbled outside and leaned against the brick wall. At one end of the yard was a well. I pulled up a bucket and plunged my face into the cold water. I came up gasping and did it again and again. The drenching and the few minutes allowed me to regain self-control.

  Soon after I left the courthouse.

  “Miss Violet Dancey!”

  The voice sounded from behind. I whirled around.

  Dr. VanZeldt was scurrying down Main Street, his pale kid leather shoes scuffing up dust. He held out a walking stick before him as if he would attack me with it, but his expression was eager and benign.

  I might have run in the opposite direction if I hadn’t pitied him for his experience at the hospital.

  He reached me, puffing a little, and touched the edge of his hat. Up close, his eyes were distorted by the thick glasses, and his shiny pink skin had an odd, stretched look.

  “Yes, sir?” I said.

  “Miss Violet Dancey, I want to thank you for your kindness to Amenze. You impress us. Impress us, indeed.” He held out his hand as if to shake mine. Instead, he captured my fingers in his damp palm and enclosed them tightly with his other hand. He had a slight accent.

  “It was n-nothing,” I stammered, trying unsuccessfully to regain my hand. “Just a little confusion about her money. Anybody could have helped.”

  He seemed not to hear what I said. His brow furrowed and he held up my palm as if to study it. “You have been … touching someone who departed this world very recently.”

  I wrenched my hand from his grasp and wiped it against my skirt. “At the hospital.” My breath came out heavy.

  “What a pity,” Dr. VanZeldt said, and his eyes were full of compassion. “He was very young.”

  “What … How do you know?”

  “Ah, some of his energy yet clings to you, and sensing such things is one of my skills. But you sell yourself short when you say anyone would have helped our Amenze. Around here, very few would. My people are the—ahem—proverbial pariahs.”

  “I’m sorry folks haven’t been welcoming. And I’m sorry they won’t let you assist with the wounded.”

  “Yes, you saw.” A knowing, bitter look sparked in his magnified eyes. “They do not understand what they are rejecting. They are fools. Nevertheless, that is neither here nor there. What I want you to please know is that we are in your debt. Amenze is most precious. It is our hope that we will all get to know one another better. I have been asked to invite you to dine with us one day at Shadowlawn.”

  The thought of seeing the VanZeldts doing anything so ordinary as eating made the invitation almost tempting. However, I did not want to know the doctor better. Although he looked well scrubbed in his white suit with his shiny pink skin, a sense of something unclean oozed out of him.

  I managed a vague smile. “Maybe someday. Amenze seemed very sweet. I … um”—I half turned—“ought to be going.”

  He tipped his hat again and I hastened down the road, anxious in a way I did not fully understand. I needed to get home.

  At Scuppernong, I entered the sitting room to find Seeley sprawled, scrawny and shirtless, on the sofa, very pale, with a bloody bandage wrapped rakishly about his head and a sling around his bony shoulder. Sunny, Miss Elsa, and Laney hovered near.

  At the s
ight I gave a gasp.

  “He’s fine, Vi-let,” Sunny said as I darted to Seeley’s side. “No need to look all wild-eyed. This is what happens to boys who climb magnolia trees like monkeys. A branch broke beneath him. Other limbs slowed his fall and he landed on soft grass. That’s all.”

  “I did see stars when my head thudded,” Seeley said. “I wondered if people really did.”

  Miss Elsa stood wringing her hands nearby. “Dorian’s King snapped his shoulder back in place. What if the fall …”

  “You should’ve heard the pop,” Seeley said.

  “No. No one should ever have to hear such a thing,” Laney said, making a face. “Not if they know what’s good for them.”

  “He was lucky. Devilishly lucky.” Dorian’s voice startled me. I hadn’t noticed him leaning carelessly against the wall behind the door. “And now he’s being a trump about it.” He gave Seeley a grin.

  Later, when I went out to find Goblin for Seeley, King loomed against the sunset as he stirred the blazing rubbish fire with a pole. I shuddered at the sight of the huge limb that had broken beneath my cousin, flames dancing along its length. Goblin’s golden eyes glowed nearby, watching.

  As I stepped softly past Miss Ruby Jewel’s little house, Jubal’s deep, gravelly voice reached me. “Miss Dancey! My mistress requests a word with you.”

  Drat! And I had walked so softly. I was returning from the long trip into town to make certain the patients were all transported and was ready to get home to Scuppernong. However, I couldn’t ignore the tall, skinny old black man. Jubal stood with his head bowed below a tangled arbor framing the front steps. I made my way up the overgrown path toward the house. Rather than cooling the air with their shade, the thickly interwoven branches of the live oaks held in oppressive heat. I forced my lips into a smile.

  No answering smile lightened Jubal’s weary eyes or lifted the melancholy droop of his face. With an almost courtly gesture, he held back the encroaching tendrils of a climbing rosebush. A streak of bright blood beaded up where thorns had torn his forehead, but he showed no sign that he noticed. He indicated the gaping mouth of his mistress’s parlor. “In here, please, ma’am, Miss Dancey.” His tone was gracious.