The Face of Heaven (34 page)

Lyndel folded her hands on the tabletop. “No, we don’t. But I felt from God I must nurse the wounded. Nathaniel felt he must resist slavery. There are two other Amish men in his platoon, including my brother.”

“What do your people think of this?”

She looked at her hands. “Well, they’re not pleased with us. They won’t talk to us anymore, won’t send letters or packages of food or warm socks or even healing herbs for the battlefield casualties. We are cut off.”

Moses shifted in his chair to gaze at Nathaniel. “How is it for you, Lieutenant?”

Nathaniel half-laughed. “No better. We’re orphans now.”

“You know that
Thou shalt not kill
is a poor translation from the old Hebrew tongue of the Bible. The commandment actually means
Thou shalt not murder.
God made allowance for Israel’s people to fight in wars for national survival and to defend themselves from personal assault.”

“
Ja, ja,
so the chaplains have explained to me. Still, when I came out of winter camp last year I felt ashamed to march with a gun on my shoulder. It’s now 1863 and I still feel guilty. Perhaps more so, for I have slain other men.”

“Who would have slain you.”

“I realize that.”

“And have slain my people by the thousands.”

“
Ja
. I’m not turning back now. My hand is to the plow. If the Lord wishes to condemn me, he must do as he sees fit. I wish we could have resolved this with prayer and goodwill. But that didn’t happen. But suppose we had marched without guns, fallen to our knees, and recited the Lord’s Prayer while the Rebels lifted their muskets to shoot? They are a religious people. I’ve read about how Lee and Stonewall and other officers are concerned to have less profanity and drinking and gambling among their troops. In particular Stonewall and Lee are anxious to get Bibles and gospel literature to their men. Would they shoot while we knelt by the ten thousand to pray?”

“Perhaps not. But neither would they give up their slaves, since they have convinced themselves the Bible permits them to hold men in bondage.”

Nathaniel furrowed his brow. “A lazy reading of the Scriptures takes them to such a place. A calmer reading with prayer and due attention to detail shows that the Spirit of the Lord moves us toward liberty of soul and mind—and body. A liberty that allows us to serve God and serve our neighbors freely.”

“I had heard you were something of a preacher. Big Frank told me the steamboat crews call you the Reverend King. With very little jest, I assure you.” He pushed his chair back and stood up. “I had best get down to the steamer.”

Nathaniel extended his hand. “We’re glad to have seen you again, Moses Gunnison. You’re a good man and will always be welcome at our home.”

Moses took the offered hand and said, “Just as you have had to become comfortable with guns, so too have I had to accept a white
man’s hand of friendship. I have never had a white man as a friend before.”

“Then you have one now,” Nathaniel said.

Moses looked down at their still joined hands, then glanced over to Lyndel’s hands. “You have no wedding bands.”

Lyndel grasped Nathaniel’s hand and kissed it. “We didn’t have the money for it, Moses. Nor is it an Amish custom.”

“A man needs his symbols.”

“It is not our custom.”

Moses stood a moment, thinking and looking at the candlelight flickering in the room. He opened a breast pocket and tugged out two plain gold rings. “My mother and father. Born in America. Died in slavery. The master whipped me to find these but I never let on where they were. Mama and Papa had them since I was a boy, I don’t know how. Only wore them at night in our shack. Hid them under the floorboards in a little pouch that was always covered with dirt.” He tossed them gently in his hand. “My good luck charms.”

“Those are very special, then,” said Lyndel. “Did you have them with you when you sheltered in our barn?”

“I did. Hidden on my body. Nehemiah Hargrove didn’t think to search me for them.”

“Was that his name—the leader of the slave hunters?”

“That’s right. Youngest son of the master. He’s with the Rebel army now.”

“My brother has seen him. He says the soldiers call him Georgey Washington.”

Moses snorted. “On account the Hargroves claim they have blood ties to President Washington. Washington set his slaves free when he died, I told them once. Bullwhipped me for that. Was Nehemiah who lynched Charlie. You see him again, God grant you lay him low in the dust forever.”

The sharp lines that had appeared on his face with the mention of Nehemiah Hargrove vanished when he put the rings in Nathaniel’s hand. “My gift. We orphans ought to help one another out.”

“Oh, no, no,” protested Nathaniel, immediately giving the gold bands back. “We can’t accept such a gift, your parents’ rings.”

“Prayers are enough for us,” Lyndel spoke up. “Truly, Moses.”

Moses thrust his hands in his pockets. “I’m not much of a praying man. I believe you’ll get farther with the rings. Every time you look at them you need to remember each other. And me. And the ones enslaved.” He wouldn’t take the bands back from Nathaniel. “It’s you who are the praying types. So pray for my people. Don’t just fight for them with your muskets and bandages. Fight for them with God and his holy angels. Those are blood rings. They tie you to one another. They tie you to me and my people.”

He opened the door and stepped out. The light of a half-moon shone on his face and uniform. He saluted. “Godspeed, Lieutenant King. I hope to see you again when this war is over.”

Nathaniel returned the salute. “God bless you, Sergeant.”

Moses smiled at Lyndel. “Mrs. King, you do look resplendent. Marriage suits you. I trust you will fare well.”

“Thank you, Mr. Gunnison. And I you.”

They watched him make his way between the cabins to the Potomac. Lyndel took the smaller ring from Nathaniel and found it fit on her ring finger a little tightly but she left it there. Nathaniel’s was too large and loose so he moved it to the next finger. The moon found the gold and made it gleam.

“How strange,” Lyndel said, gazing at the rings on their hands, “It was nothing I wished for.”

“Nor did we wish for a log house,” Nathaniel responded. “But our friends gave us one regardless.”

“Stay with me a moment, love.” She sat on the step. “I shouldn’t ask. Reveille always comes too early.”

He lowered himself beside her and she leaned her head with its white
kapp
against his shoulder. His arm went around her.

“How wonderful that Moses is alive,” Lyndel said. “I would always wonder what had happened to him.”

“Yes.”

“And wonderful that he found us.”

“We seem to be in all the papers.”

“I feel that if he’s on his way to the Mississippi to campaign, then it can’t be long for you.”

“We hear the same things you hear from the officers’ wives. Maybe on May 1st or 2nd. Or later.”

“I thank God wherever you go our ambulance wagons will be right behind you.”

“Let’s not talk about it,” he said, kissing her red hair. “These hard things come soon enough and talk doesn’t lessen the sting.”

“The wives complain that Belle Plain is muddy when it rains and the air intolerable with mosquitoes. Then they complain it gets so dusty when it’s so dry a person can’t breathe. I don’t share their ill feelings toward this place. I was married here, had my first home with you here, entertained our first visitors as husband and wife here. To me, Belle Plain is a blessing, a bit of heaven on earth.”

“Our time has been so short, I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be sorry. Our month here together has been full of wonder. I feel stronger in my body and in my spirit than I have since Fredericksburg. No other woman in the world could feel so treasured and complete and fulfilled as I do.”

“I wish I wasn’t marching.”

“Oh, I long for the day you’re a farrier with a shop under a great spreading oak tree. But not before the slavery of men like Moses Gunnison is ended. Didn’t you sense God had something to say to us through him tonight?”

“
Ja
, I did. But who knows how long it will take to turn things around, how many more battles? There have been so many defeats and reverses.”

She squeezed his hand. “I pray something special happens this summer. Something truly astonishing.”

“What would that take the form of?”

“A complete shift in fortunes.”

“We thought they had shifted with Antietam Creek.”

“I ask for something more then.”

He kissed her eyes. “What an interesting person you are. You remain irresistible.”

“Just because of my hair?”

“Just because of your mind and your spirit. I’d love to stay put another month and tell you more about it.”

She laughed. “Oh, wouldn’t that be something? Let’s see if we can pray in more April showers and stave off the spring campaign until June or July.”

But Lyndel’s long honeymoon had ended. A few days later, at noon on April 28th, she stood with the other wives on the knoll on which she had been married, the leaves thick over their heads, and watched the Iron Brigade move off with the rest of the First Corps, the men singing about hanging Jeff Davis from a sour apple tree. They were heading for Fredericksburg again, where Lee’s army had spent the winter. All the women but Lyndel had handkerchiefs to their eyes. She returned to her house, the thunder of thousands of men’s voices still distinct in the distance, and swept the floor and front step clean.

After that she picked radishes and lettuce, made a salad for two, sat at the table and ate her portion, then opened a window and let a spring breeze take the house of cards down one wall at a time. She turned to Psalm 91 in her Bible, read it, and got up to pack her bag, the words running like a creek of new water between the banks of her fears:
Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.

Four hours after her husband had marched deeper into Virginia she sat with Morganne David and three physicians in a wagon that bounced and rolled in his footsteps, dust hanging like gauze in the afternoon light.

No matter what happens, I will maintain hope. No matter how many more defeats, I will maintain hope, Lord, and believe you wish our nation to be free and slavery to come to an end as much as I do, as much as Nathaniel does, and that all the sacrifice will prove to have been worthwhile by the time this mighty storm of war has passed.

22

L
yndel was having a dream. She knew it was a dream, but it was an important dream and even while she slept she told herself she wanted to remember it. Yet as soon as Morganne shook her shoulder gently and said it was time to get up, she opened her eyes, glimpsed briefly the images of the dream, then saw them instantly vanish, never to come back. She sat up in the dark of the covered wagon and looked out at a large mansion with a sagging door and slates missing from its roof. Starlight seemed to be caught in the treetops.

“Where are we?” asked Lyndel.

“That must have been a deep sleep,” responded Morganne. “We’re at the Fitzhugh House. We pulled in here a few hours ago. The First Corps is scattered all around us. There’s going to be an assault by the Iron Brigade across the Rappahannock to clear the way for the rest of the corps. Rebel troops are dug in on the opposite bank. Come on, Lyndy. We need to get our field hospital set up for the casualties.”

Lyndel climbed out of the wagon, found a basin and towel on the tailgate, splashed the water onto her face, began to gather up supplies, and followed Morganne in the dark. They came to a large open-walled tent with long tables for surgery. Some soldiers were resting on the ground but others were standing in groups and talking in low voices while a number explored the grounds of the Fitzhugh House.

“Where is the brigade, Davey?” Lyndel asked.

“Already assembled on the riverbank. They’re just waiting for the boats. Stay here.”

“I didn’t see Nathaniel last night.”