Time-Travel Duo

by James Paddock

  Anne looked down at Elizabeth Anne.

  No, you’re thinking crazy, woman. Life doesn’t go in circles like that. We live, we die, that’s it.

  Anne listened to Gertie cooing to Samuel Cooper.

  Or is it?

  Chapter 11

  Sunday ~ July 18, 1943

  James Lamric was up early trimming bushes for his mother; tidying up her work shed and doing various chores she needed done; a routine he was accustomed to nearly every Sunday morning. He wasn’t a churchgoer, much to his mother’s displeasure. Johnny’s ship was in Charleston another five days. It was home-ported in Norfolk, Virginia, but stopped at the shipyard for repairs. Their mother made Johnny promise to come home for dinner if he could get off sometime over the weekend. His ship, the USS Plymouth, ran convoy escort up and down the east coast, however, there was talk of Johnny being transferred. The Plymouth had an over abundance of signalmen, and a new ship, the USS Wadsworth, in the shipyard also for emergency repairs, was in need of experienced Petty Officers in communications. His mother wasn’t in favor of it. The new ship would take him to the Pacific. Johnny, however, definitely wanted to be where the real war was instead of doing escort and chasing sub reports.

  By the time his mother returned from church, James was cleaned up. “I’m going to run some errands and then go by the hospital,” he told her. “I’ll be back in a couple hours.”

  Mrs. Lamric was sitting at the old kitchen table reading the morning paper. “Look at this, James,” she said before he could get to the door. She pointed to a small article in the previous day’s paper “Roosevelt and Churchill have given an ultimatum to Italy. Give up or be destroyed. Surrender honorably and live. They’ve got men dropping leaflets out of airplanes to the Italian people. It appears as though we have just about got Sicily and we’ve left Naples in shambles.” She stopped and poked her finger in the middle of another page. “And here, we dropped eighty tons of bombs on some Japanese in the Pacific.” She sighed and began shaking her head. “When is this all going to end? It hurts my heart to think of all the boys that are dying, not only Americans and British and all, but all those German and Italian boys, and Jap Boys, too. They all have families. Why are they doing this to themselves? How many are going to be dead before this is over?” She laid the paper and her glasses down, stood and turned to look out the kitchen window. “I’m sorry, James.” She said, wiping her eyes.

  “It’s all right, Ma. At least Johnny isn’t there right now.”

  “I know. And I’m glad you’re not.”

  “I should be there, Ma. I don’t feel right about it.”

  “I know, Son, I know. But I’ll be grateful to the Captain as long as I live. I don’t know how he did it, but I’ll always be grateful he did.” They both stood silent for a while, he drying his hands, she staring out the window, drying her eyes.

  “Well,” she finally said, “is that Miss Morgan you’re going by Roper to see, James?” Mrs. Lamric knew he had not been seeing anyone in quite some time. She felt that it just wasn’t healthy to be without a woman at his age. She liked Miss Morgan and felt she was the perfect choice for him. She hoped by bringing her name up frequently, he would eventually get a notion to seriously court her.

  “No, Ma, she works the night shift. Besides, she’s only a friend.”

  “Well she’s a pretty friend to have, James. You should invite her over for dinner sometime. She’s such a nice girl, and from such a nice family too. Why, they took care of you and your brother some fifteen years ago when your father, God bless his soul, and I had to go to Atlanta that time. Times were hard and they wouldn’t take no money.”

  “I know, Ma. I’ve heard the story many times. I’m just going to the hospital to visit a lady I helped last night.”

  “Oh, a lady! How old is she?”

  “Don’t get excited, Ma. She’s married and with child, or was. She was in labor when I left her. I promised her I would stop and check up on her today.” He paused reflectively for a moment. “There’s something strange about her though.”

  Ruth turned away from the window. “Oh! Sit down. Let me fix you some lunch before you go.” She tapped his place at the table. “What’s so strange about her?”

  James pulled up a chair while his mother expertly moved about the kitchen. She didn’t have to tell him twice to eat. “Her husband wasn’t with her. She asked me to call him.”

  “So, what’s so strange about that?”

  “The phone numbers she gave me. Two different ones. They’re seven digits each.”

  “She was just confused.”

  “Yes, but she was saying she lived in a place called Goose Creek, between Summerville and Monck’s Corner.”

  Mrs. Lamric stopped briefly in the middle of slicing bread. “No,” she said as she pushed the knife on through, “I don’t remember anything up there except maybe a couple small communities of poor farmers.”

  “She also said something about a Dr. Rose and a Tri-Dent Regional Hospital where she wanted to go to have her baby. That’s where she was headed when I came upon her, in front of Roper. She collapsed right in my arms.”

  Mrs. Lamric stopped what she was doing again to think. “Nope, never heard of no Tri-Dent Hospital. She was obviously delirious, being in labor and all.”

  “Well, maybe, but there’s more.”

  Mrs. Lamric placed a plate in front of him then sat across the table with a cup of coffee in her hand. “Go on. I’m listening. Eat your sandwich.”

  “Well,” he said as he took a bite, “the clothes she wore were different. Not even like clothes important people from New York or such places would wear. It actually seemed even classier than that, but her dress was short, very short.”

  Mrs. Lamric raised her eyebrows.

  “Above her knees! But she didn’t seem like that kind of lady.”

  Mrs. Lamric made a face but decided not to say anything, choosing to not make fun of her son’s innocence.

  “And very colorful, deep rich color, like I’ve never seen before. And the material – very smooth and rich feeling...” James drifted off in thought as he finished his sandwich. “Well thanks for the sandwich, Ma. I’ll check back in a couple of hours,” he said as he got up to leave, but his mother grabbed his arm.

  “Sit back down, James. You’re not telling me everything. I see the look on your face. I know that look. You’re a good cop but you can’t put one over on your mother. Your father couldn’t put one past me either. There’s something about this lady you’re afraid to tell me.” James dropped his eyes away from hers to the floor. “See, now you’re turning red. Come on. Out with it. Does she have an extra breast or something?”

  James jerked his head up in surprise. “Ma!”

  “Don’t Ma me. Does she have three breasts or not?”

  “No!” James couldn’t believe his ears.

  “All right then. It can’t be any worse than that. What is it that you can’t tell your own mother?”

  James pulled the chair away from the table and sat back down, shaking his head back and forth as he did so. “Okay, okay. Before I left the hospital, I was having a cup of coffee with Nurse Morgan. She told me that this lady, Mrs. Waring, was brought in earlier by ambulance from the Navy Base. They had some kind of story that they didn’t know where she had come from, but that she had just showed up in a barracks and that her water had broken.” He looked back up at his mother.

  “Okay, that’s normal. Go on.”

  “When she arrived, she was wrapped in a blanket and was carrying her clothes.”

  “Probably got wet when her water broke.”

  “I guess so. Anyway, she had a confrontation of some sort with the doctor and old Nurse Turner and then decided to leave to go to her own hospital.”

  “Tri-Dent, right?”

  “Yeah, Tri-Dent Regional she said. So she got herself dressed and walked out. That’s when I found her, in front of the hospital about to pass out. I carried her back in.”

&nb
sp; “Now, what else aren’t you telling me? I know you’ve left something out.”

  “I’m getting to that. First things first. While I was talking to Nurse Morgan, a new young nurse in training had been sent in to clean up the exam room where Mrs. Waring had first been taken. We were standing there with our cups of coffee when she, the new nurse, comes down with this thing in her hands, like your nylon stockings only bigger.”

  “What do you mean, bigger?”

  “I mean bigger, like a pair of pants only made of nylon. Nurse Morgan said ‘Like panties with feet.’ Mrs. Waring had thrown them in the trash.”

  Mrs. Lamric’s mouth hung open for some time, then she said, “Must be some French thing or something. She isn’t foreign, is she?”

  “No, at least I don’t think so. She has no accent, at least no foreign accent. She does sound to be from the north, like New York or Boston.”

  “Well, that’s it. You don’t know what they’re doing in those big cities. You should have seen Atlanta. It was almost disgusting,” Mrs. Lamric said, making a face.

  “That’s everything, Ma.” James said as he stood and put his chair away. “Nothing more to tell you. I’ve got to go. Thanks for lunch,” and quickly he was out the door.

  Mrs. Lamric watched out the kitchen window as her son climbed into his father’s Desoto. It became hers when he died, but now it really belonged to James. After all, she had never learned to drive. As he pulled out of the yard and disappeared down the street, she rinsed off his plate and placed it in the drainer. “Panties with feet?” she questioned out loud. “Nylon?”

  Chapter 12

  Sunday ~ July 18, 1943

  James parked the freshly washed Desoto in the hospital parking lot, appreciating the lack of heat on what would normally be a hot July afternoon. The front door of the hospital was propped open.

  “Good afternoon, Maggie.” Everyone called Nurse Margaret McGregory by her nickname, Maggie. Many didn’t even know her by any other name.

  “How are you doing today, Mr. Lamric? Are you here on business or just visiting?”

  “I’m fine Maggie. Actually a little of both. I assisted a confused young lady who was in labor last night and I told her I would visit her today. Anne Waring. Is she ready for visitors?”

  Maggie began laughing. “She’s the talk of the hospital, the way her and Turner put each other in their places last night.”

  “Whom were you rooting for?”

  She laughed again, “I’m not even going to tell you. Too many ears around here. Go on up to the third floor. Check with Nurse Stephens. She’ll let you know if Mrs. Waring can be seen.”

  “Thanks, Maggie.”

  Anne lay on her side, staring blankly at the black curtained window. She had stopped thinking and for the past hour, since they took Elizabeth back to the nursery, she filled her mind with the blackness of the curtain. She was determined to remain like this until it was time to feed Elizabeth again.

  “Mrs. Waring,” a voice said and she felt a touch on her shoulder. “Mrs. Waring.”

  Anne slowly rolled to her back and looked at the nurse.

  “You have a visitor, Mrs. Waring.”

  Steven! Anne immediately thought as she quickly sat up. He’s found me. Then she thought to ask, “Who?”

  “Mr. Lamric, Ma’am.”

  “Who?”

  “Officer Lamric. The police officer who brought you in last night.”

  “Oh,” Anne replied with disappointment.

  “Do you remember?”

  “Yes, I remember,” she said as her chin dropped to her chest. “I really don’t want to see anyone right now.” She returned her head to the pillow and rolled back to the curtain.

  “Yes, Ma’am,” the nurse said after reflecting on Anne’s mental attitude, then returned to her station.

  “She doesn’t want to see anyone, Mr. Lamric.”

  James stood with his hands in his pockets, looking down at the nurse. “When do you think she’ll be ready for visitors?”

  “I really don’t know. It’s her choice.”

  “Is she okay? No problems or anything?”

  “No problems. She’s fine. And the baby is fine too. She just doesn’t want visitors.”

  James considered saying it was necessary to see her for the police report, and then thought better of it. After all, he didn’t even write a report on the incident. It seemed too trivial at the time. “Thanks. I’ll check back again tomorrow.”

  As James stepped onto the elevator, he nearly ran into a Navy chief, with a bag hanging over his shoulder.

  “May I help you, Chief?” Nurse Stephens asked as he approached her desk. James curiously analyzed the odd looking bag the chief was carrying until the elevator doors closed.

  “Yes, Ma’am. I was told a Mrs. Waring was on this floor.”

  “She is, but she’s not receiving visitors right now, unless you’re Mr. Waring.”

  The chief looked about, as if not knowing what to do, then pulled the bag off his shoulder. “No, I’m not. I’m Chief Savage, Thomas Savage. I believe this is hers. I wanted to make sure she gets it.” He set the bag on the floor next to the counter.

  “I’ll make sure she does. Anything else? Any messages?”

  “No, no messages, but, thank you very much,” the Chief said. He turned and pressed the elevator call button.

  Two floors below, James stepped off the elevator, waved to Maggie and said, “Thanks.”

  “That was quick,” Maggie commented. “She not up to visitors?”

  “No, apparently not. I’ll check back tomorrow.”

  “I guess that Navy Chief who just went up is going to be disappointed too.”

  “Chief? Her husband maybe?”

  “No, I don’t believe so. He said something about delivering something she had left at the base.”

  “Oh, well thanks again.” James remembered the bag the chief was carrying and took a seat in the waiting area where he could watch the elevator doors. Since the moment she fell into his arms, and he felt her fragileness, the strange but preciseness of her dress and her mind numbing fragrance, James was taken with her. He knew he shouldn’t be, but this strange woman intrigued him. He attempted to discard any romantic feelings he knew he had been experiencing and replace it with a professional curiosity. He was beginning to realize his error in not writing an official police report. A strange person shows up unexplained with no identification, dressed in odd clothes, making odd statements, and in the middle of a war. A spy would not be so obvious, he thought. The elevator door opened. Of course it all could be a diversion.

  “Chief,” James called as the Navy chief passed by.

  “Yes.”

  James found himself facing a man who was nearly as big as he. He held up a badge. “I’m Officer Lamric with the Charleston Police Department. Do you have a moment?”

  “I need to get back to work. What’s it about officer?”

  James reached out his hand. “Call me James, and you are?”

  Chief Savage took his hand, both men presenting a very firm grip. “Savage, Thomas Savage.”

  “Nice to meet you, Thomas. I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about Mrs. Waring, Anne Waring, the young woman you brought here last night?”

  The chief glanced over at the nurse then said, quietly, “let’s step outside if you don’t mind. It’s a hell of a nice morning.”

  “Sure,” James replied and they both moved toward the open door.

  Finding a seat on a low wall, the Chief pulled out a pack of Lucky Strikes, offered one to James who declined, then lit one for himself. He proceeded to drag a lung full, and exhale it before he spoke. “I was going to say she’s a rare woman, but no, she’s simply...” He stopped for a second searching for the right word.

  “Peculiar?” James inserted.

  “I’d say mysterious, but in an unconventional sort of way. I’ve never seen a woman as quick-witted as she,” he paused, “or sharp tongued.”


  “Then you talked to her a bit?”

  “Personally, not too much, but I was there from the time she woke up until she left by ambulance.”

  “Woke up?”

  “Yeah. She was passed out when one of my men found her.”

  “Are you sure she wasn’t just asleep?”

  “Passed out, Mr. Lamric, in a room with sixty beds. She was in a ball on the floor, out like a light.”

  “Okay, why don’t you tell me the entire story, as best as you can remember?” James took out his notebook, wrote several things on a page then said, “About what time was she discovered?”

  “It was 1930. We’re normally back from the chow hall earlier, but a thunderstorm forced us to take shelter for some time. The first man in the barracks found her.”

  “Don’t you have a security watch and a roving patrol?”

  “I had one roving security and fire watch. It’s just a transit barracks. We’re more worried about fire than anything else. And, no, the watch didn’t see or hear anything. I’ve questioned him inside and out.”

  “Okay, then what?”

  The chief continued with his story, from her waking up until she left the barracks. James only interrupted him once, when he mentioned the rabbit.

  “Rabbit!” James exclaimed. “Where did that come from?”

  “He was tucked up inside her clothing.”

  “What has she said about that?”

  “I had one of the men take the rabbit away before she woke up. I clean forgot about it and she never brought it up. I’ve got him with me in hopes she could tell me what to do with him.”