Patricia Potter (39 page)

She shivered, and the movement apparently made Socrates even more nervous. He suddenly made a leap past Henry Cooper, who reacted by shouting. One oar went spinning out of his hand into the water. At the same time, there was a shout from the Virginia side of the river, and a gunshot rang out.

The boat scraped the bottom of the river as she heard curses. “Bloody hell,” came from the front of the boat. “Goddamn,” came from the middle. Socrates was screaming.

“Get out,” Adrian yelled at her, and she jumped into the river just as the boat was caught again in a current and swung back out into the river.

A hand caught her, guiding her to shore. “A friend,” she heard Adrian call out.

And then they stumbled out of the river and were surrounded by a number of gray-clad men aiming pistols at them. Lauren held on to Adrian for everything she was worth. She felt a sticky wetness on her hand and looked down.

Blood was dripping from Adrian’s shirt, a large red circle staining the blue shirt he had stolen from the Union soldiers.

CHAPTER 22

Socrates had jumped with Adrian, and now he scurried around his master, as if knowing something was wrong.

Several guns aimed at the animal, just as they were aimed at Adrian and Lauren, when a man with a distinct air of authority stepped up. His gray clothes were worn, and he, like the others, wore no insignia. But there was no question he was an officer.

His eyes skimmed over Adrian, then Lauren, and, amusedly, at Socrates, and finally back to Adrian. “Who,” he asked, “in the hell are you?”

Adrian’s hand had gone to his shoulder. He was starting to feel pain there, a fierce burning. “Adrian Cabot.”

The officer’s mouth twitched. “The blockade runner.”

Adrian nodded as the pain started to spread, burning, weakening him. He had felt the blow in the boat, but not the agony, not until now. He nodded curtly.

One of the men in gray came up from the river carrying the saddlebags that Adrian had lost in trying to grab Lauren. They were wet, as was the man who went in after them.

The officer held out his hand. “Captain Amos Kelly,” he said. “I’m with Mosby. We’ve sorta been expectin’ you. Thought you would be farther down river, though.”

“Expecting us?”

“Yanks are goin’ crazy, what with losin’ you. Been burnin’ up the wires we have access to. Big reward for you and the lady there …” He bowed. “Miss Bradley, I believe.” His amused glance went to Socrates, who was now hanging on to Lauren. “And the monkey, of course. We didn’t catch his name. We have orders to offer any assistance.”

“Then why did you shoot?” Lauren asked angrily.

Amos Kelly had the grace to color. “Like I said, we thought you would be farther south, if you got this far … and then Cooper ain’t that particular over who he brings across. And in this damned mist, it could have been a patrol boat. That ungodly scream startled one of my men …”

But all of Lauren’s attention now was on the growing red circle on Adrian’s shirt. “I’ve got to look at that.”

“We have a doctor in camp,” Amos Kelly offered.

“How far?” Lauren said tightly.

“An hour’s ride. He can have one of our horses. We can double up.”

Lauren shook her head as she saw blood puddle at Adrian’s feet and his face set with pain. “I don’t think we can wait that long.”

The amusement fled the Confederate officer’s face. He motioned the others to fade into the woods out of sight of the river. Lauren and Adrian followed, drops of blood trailing in his wake. Once into cover, Lauren looked about, finally finding a fallen tree trunk. Socrates was running around, his mouth working furiously with some monkey imprecations of his own.

Adrian sat, and Lauren unbuttoned the newly soaked shirt. A musket ball had entered his shoulder and had not exited. Blood was running from the jagged wound. Lauren knew a feeling of helplessness. She had watched her father extract bullets before, but she had neither the instruments nor the skill to do it herself here.

“Clean water,” she said. “Does anyone have clean water?”

One gray-clad man offered a canteen. “Got some whiskey, too,” he offered.

Lauren accepted both. She washed the wound as best she could, then rinsed it with the alcohol, wishing that she had been shot instead of Adrian as, despite his clenched teeth, a moan filtered from deep within his throat.

“Hey,” the man who had given her the whiskey said, “I meant for him to drink it.”

Lauren thought of the muddy Potomac water that had soaked into the wound and continued with her efforts, tearing a piece of material from her dress and binding it tight against the wound to slow the bleeding.

When she was through, she felt sick. Adrian’s face was white, and the bandage of homespun was already darkening with blood despite her best efforts.

Captain Kelly already had some of his men mounted, and now he helped Adrian up onto one of the horses, then Lauren, who had to ride astride. But that didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but Adrian. Socrates was with her; he had to be forcibly removed from Adrian, as the animal apparently sensed something was wrong and chattered worriedly.

She tried to calm him as they moved quickly, but her eyes kept going to Adrian, whose back was straight, too straight. He was usually so relaxed in the saddle. She closed her eyes. An hour until they reached a physician.

She knew it would be the longest hour of her life.

There was no morphine.

Lauren offered to help—she told the doctor that she had assisted her father, a surgeon—and the doctor finally agreed. He was getting ready to move out. What wounded he’d had from hit-and-run raids and skirmishes had been sent to Williamsburg. He’d been ordered north to meet the retreating Confederates.

Lauren had looked at him with horror when he said there was no morphine or chloroform. Whiskey was all he had.

The doctor shook his head. “Without men like him,” he said, indicating Adrian, “we wouldn’t have any medicines at all. Right now, all we have is in Pennsylvania, and God knows it’s not enough.”

He gave Adrian a cup of whiskey, and then another. Adrian’s eyes started to glaze, but whether from the alcohol or the pain, Lauren wasn’t sure. She only knew he was hurting. As she was.

But not nearly as much as when the doctor started probing for the ball, and she heard Adrian’s smothered oaths. She cleaned the blood from the area, and Adrian’s every agonized move made her tremble. After one muted groan, Adrian fainted. The doctor breathed a sigh of relief and dug out the musket ball, which was followed by a flood of blood.

Lauren watched as the doctor sewed up the wound. Adrian’s eyes were closed, but his face was still lined with pain. Her hand reached out to touch his face, to try to smooth out the traces of agony. She wondered whether she could ever smooth them out of her mind.

“He should be all right,” the doctor said, “if there’s no infection. You wouldn’t like to go with us, would you, missy? We can use another pair of hands.”

Lauren looked down at Adrian. He would wake soon. The pain would be even worse with all the probing of tender skin and muscles. “No … thank you.”

The doctor followed her gaze. “You don’t know how much we need more of them … the blockade runners.” He shook his head. “Amputating without morphine … if there’s a hell, that’s it.”

Lauren bit her lip and took Adrian’s hands in hers. It had been so easy in Delaware, so easy in Washington, to think her mission noble. Adrian’s ship had been carrying cannon, but it had also probably been carrying medicines. Had she, on top of everything else, sentenced men to agony? Was that what Larry would have wanted?

It was a thought beyond bearing. Nothing, she was discovering, was all right or wrong, black or white. There were so many shades in between.

She stayed with Adrian through the evening. The tent vanished, and so did the doctor, both piled in a wagon headed toward northern Virginia. Some of Captain Kelly’s men went to escort him, but the captain himself was charged with scouting the banks of the Potomac, even now that the action was hundreds of miles away. There were still spies slipping across, as well as ranging bands of Yanks. And ladies to save, he added gallantly.

One of his men who, Captain Kelly said, had a special affinity with animals had taken temporary custody of Socrates. But not without mishap. Socrates bit his keeper once, and escaped into the medical tent before it had been dismantled. Recaptured, he later escaped again and found Adrian lying under a tree. With a pitiable cry, the monkey crawled next to him, laying his head on Adrian’s leg.

No one dared approach the monkey, not even Lauren, after Socrates bared his teeth when he felt she might be trying to take him from Adrian. So Lauren let Socrates be, as she sat next to Adrian’s head, washing beads of sweat from it, trying to keep him still as he thrashed in half-conscious agony.

“Adrian, what have I done to you?” she whispered once. She knew from the doctor, from her own knowledge, how prevalent disease and infection were, and she had nothing, the doctor had had nothing, to prevent them. She could only keep Adrian as cool and comfortable as possible.

Day faded into night, and she stayed at his side, as did Socrates. Adrian woke several times, his lips clenched tightly against the pain as he moved. He looked up once and smiled faintly. “An angel … I didn’t think they existed.”

She had swallowed down her denial. She was anything but that for him, and as soon as he was well …

Lauren was still awake, her back stiff, when he woke again. Adrian and Captain Kelly talked briefly, and the captain said he would have a detail escort them to the next Confederate unit when Adrian was well enough. They were, he said again, to have every assistance. The Confederate Government held Captain Cabot in high esteem.

Adrian had tried to move, agony clouding his features again as he did so. But still his hand went down to Socrates, who looked at him beseechingly. Lauren had to smile at them. In the weeks she had known them—it seemed like years now—Socrates was constantly getting them in trouble. She wondered at a man who had the patience to continue loving such a beast.

She wondered if he would … could … do the same with her, for she had committed much worse atrocities than Socrates, and she didn’t have the excuse of innocence.

Lauren erased the notions from her head, devoting herself instead to making Adrian as comfortable as possible. She had taken up a collection of food from the soldiers—Mrs. Cooper’s food had been ruined in the river—and had made a broth of salt pork and wild onions and dried corn. It wasn’t much, but at least it was hot.

She had to feed Adrian, since his right shoulder was now swathed in bandages that made movement difficult. She sensed his frustration at his helplessness, at yet another delay in reaching England and finding another ship.

But as always, he kept his feelings to himself. She often found his eyes on her, and she never knew quite what he was thinking. The blue of his eyes was so impenetrable. He kept his thoughts, and his pain, to himself.

His interest had flared briefly as Captain Kelly told them the war news. Adrian and Lauren had apparently just missed Jeb Stuart’s troops in Maryland. Stuart had chased a Federal supply wagon nearly to Washington and captured 125 wagons, but it had made him late to Gettysburg. Garbled reports were still coming in from the battlefield there. Apparently there were enormous casualties on both sides, and Lee was retreating. Captain Kelly gave the accounts with a set face; he was obviously unhappy with orders keeping him on patrol duty.

Adrian finally sank back into sleep, his face still lined with weariness and pain … and some of the same sense of defeat that haunted the faces of their Confederate hosts.

It was the next afternoon, when he was sleeping, that Lauren remembered the book she’d taken from the farmhouse. The saddlebags had gone into the river with Adrian, but a Confederate soldier, not sure who they were or whether the saddlebags held any intelligence of importance, had grabbed them.

They had been returned to her, and she’d gone through them. The food was ruined, but though the book was wet she believed it salvageable. She’d set it out to dry, and now she went to it, picking it up and carrying it to where Adrian slept listlessly.

The book was a diary, much of the writing now running together, but a few pages still legible. Lauren turned to the middle of the book until she found a page she could read. The handwriting was neat, concise.

June 12, 1861

Tomorrow is my wedding day.

I only wish with all my heart that my mother and father would attend, but I am, they say, no longer their daughter.

And so I am staying with my future sister-in-law. Tomorrow I’ll marry the man I’ve always loved, and I will become his alone. There is a sadness in that, but I can do nothing else. He may die next week, next month, next year. I will not miss this chance to love him, to share his life, to bear his child …

The writing ran then, the ink melding into the cream of the paper. Lauren started to pass those pages when she heard Adrian move restlessly next to her.