No Greater Glory

by Cindy Nord

  Except for the distant and ongoing rumbles of cannon fire, she heard only the crickets singing.

  Emaline forced herself to relax and leaned back in the chair, pulling the knitted shawl over her shoulder. Sometime during the evening, the wool had slipped down around her waist. Beneath the desk, her feet slid into leather house shoes. Then, the faint whickering of horses, close and defined, filtered in through the window along with the dust-infused scent of an approaching rain. Chinking bridle rings told her the noise hadn’t come from her mare or the mules in the stable. Emaline bolted upright and opened the desk drawer.

  She withdrew Brennen’s pistol. Always loaded, the Adams revolver weighed heavy in her hands. She rose to her feet and edged around the desk. The shawl tumbled to the floor. Unmistakable scuffling of boots upon the front veranda brought her to the top of the dark stairs.

  Oh, dear God…not again.

  Visions of ol’ Moses screamed across her memory and she again tasted the bile of fury. A pack of filthy despots had cornered her servant down by the river last fall. Taunting Moses as he fished for their supper, the renegades heckled him, robbed him of his days’ catch, and then mercilessly beat the man. Benjamin’s trusty servant, who had served him faithfully for more than forty years, lived only long enough to see the first snowfall in December.

  Even now, the tragedy sickened her.

  Damned filthy deserters!

  She’d shoot every last coward herself if she had the opportunity.

  Robbed of any guiding light, Emaline slipped down the main staircase and crossed through the parlor by memory. Most of the heavier furniture remained stacked in the attic and the sparsely decorated room still echoed the emptiness of her life since Reece’s departure. She peered out the window. Swollen clouds stole the moonlight, and Emaline saw only the blurry outline of milling soldiers.

  Were they Yankees? Southerners? Damnation. She couldn’t tell.

  One of them shoved open the front door and Emaline melded against the curtains. She’d have only one chance to shoot them. She had to pick the best time. The stench of sweat and horses assaulted her nostrils and she held her breath, pointing the revolver toward the group.

  “I know I saw a light comin’ from upstairs.” A gruff voice filled the foyer as four shadowy figures entered the house. “You sure she’s still here? Hell, anyone could be roaming around this big house.”

  Emaline hesitated.

  She?

  Her finger eased off the trigger.

  They’re looking for me?

  They carried a large, bulky body between them and another voice she did not recognize whispered, “Where we gonna’ put him, Cap’n? This sonofabitch ain’t light, you know.”

  Captain?

  Her heart lurched in her chest and sent a fresh wave of fear up her spine. A captain had been the one to beat ol’ Moses to a pulp. The servant had managed to share that bit of information before he lapsed into unconsciousness. Had the pig returned this time with a few more of his thugs? Emaline strained forward, squinting in an attempt to see better. Nothing helped. It was too dark to decipher faces and the low roll of thunder masked their whispered words.

  The load they carried was no doubt an injured comrade.

  The men lumbered up the stairs and disappeared into the interior of the second floor. Emaline followed, hugging the wall so the stairs would not creak as she ascended behind them. She’d take her time and make her aim count.

  Lightning split the night and illuminated the house in a silver wash. The men shuffled down the hall and finally entered Benjamin’s old room. She heard a muddled mixture of mumbling and cursing, and then lamplight flooded the hallway from the open doorway.

  Emaline eased around the doorjamb and peered into the master suite. Her nostrils again flared. The musty odor of the room’s neglect mingled with the bite of horse sweat and unwashed bodies. The soldiers had placed the large form in the center of the bed and clustered around it.

  Their backs were to her, but in the dim, wavering light, she saw a mismatched ensemble of uniform pants, jackets, and homespun shirts. She glimpsed only part of the body that occupied the great berth, but the marauder wore Union blue trousers. The yellow cord sewed into the side seam of his pants leg indicated cavalry. The fact that these men knew their way around her home was puzzling.

  Regardless, she wanted no part of them.

  Emaline’s heart rammed against her ribcage, yet she took a fortifying breath and stepped into the lamplight. The Adams pointed straight at the intruders, though their features remained lost in the haze.

  “Move away from the bed.” Her finger curled around the trigger when they swung to face her. “I’ll kill the first one who as much as twitches.”

  “She’s gonna shoot us,” one soldier shouted, lunging sideways.

  The other two dropped beside the bed out of sight.

  Her gaze cut to the lean, shaggy-haired ruffian left standing near the side table. A thick, scruffy beard covered his face. Something about him made her finger ease off the trigger. Recognition swept through her just as his stoic face brightened into a beloved grin.

  Her knees went weak.

  Her jaw dropped open.

  The hair on the nape of her neck tingled. “Oh my God,” she whispered. The Adams fell to her side at the end of her limp arm. “Brennen?”

  “Yes. And dammit, Em, don’t shoot me.”

  Emaline laid the revolver on the highboy and surged into the room toward him. She flung herself into his outstretched arms, the impact causing his slouch hat to tumble from his head and hang by its leather lanyard around his neck.

  Brennen hugged her. “You scared me witless waving that gun around.”

  “Well, you scared me half to death sneaking around in here like this. Why didn’t you just holler?”

  “Good God, deserters from both sides have been ransacking plantations all along the Rappahannock. We couldn’t just barge in here screaming. We didn’t know what the hell we’d find inside.”

  She buried her head against his chest, her hands splaying across his gray, unadorned shell jacket. Relief that he was alive engulfed her in joyful waves. She pushed back and stared at him. “I’m so glad you’re here.” She looked at his soldiers.

  No one smiled back.

  She cast her eyes down to the bloody figure on the bed and let out a sharp gasp. Her pulse quickened so fast she could scarcely find her next breath. Everything else around her faded into oblivion.

  Reece.

  A sense of urgency engulfed her, overriding all other cascading emotions. She pushed from her brother’s embrace, nearly toppling him backward.

  Brennen sidestepped to give her more room. “We’d been fightin’ over near the Wilderness and stumbled across him, Em. I think he’s still alive.”

  Emaline assessed the wicked gash across the forehead, then the deeper, more critical wound in his chest. With her concentration solely on Reece, she raised her left hand and grasped the grubby coat sleeve of the closest soldier. She pulled him to her, her voice cracking under the oppressive weight that pressed down upon her heart. “I’ll need water, and lots of rags. And, I’ll need a fire laid.” She met the stranger’s solemn expression. “Also, downstairs in the kitchen, you’ll find some pots. Bring me the biggest one you can find, filled with water, and suspend it over a fire in here. Go now!”

  The stranger shifted his eyes to her brother for approval. He must have nodded. The soldier pulled from her grasp and left.

  “Since the colonel helped me escape last year and all, I couldn’t just leave him out there in that mess,” Brennen said. “He’d have died for sure.”

  The truth of his words cut her like a knife. “You did right to bring him to me, Brennen. Please hurry. Down in the pantry you’ll find my medical pouch. There’s still medicine left from the supplies he sent me.” She swallowed. In a shallow breath, she added, “And fetch Euley. She’s out back with Israel. The last cabin on the right.”

  “I’ll get her
but we can’t stay. We’ve slipped away only long enough to bring him here.” Brennen motioned for the other two soldiers to leave the room. “We’ll gather some wood and get a fire going up here, but then we’ve got to go.”

  “But…you just got here.” Her eyes widened.

  “I know,” he muttered, cupping her face. “But we’ve got to go back.” Worry starched the creases that etched his gaunt features. “I’m sorry to dump him on you like this, but I figured you’d want to try to save him, if you could. It’s the best I can do. I’ll go get Euley now.” His hands dropped and he headed out the door.

  Emaline turned back to Reece.

  Only the sporadic rise and fall of his chest told her he lived. The beard stubble, dark and smeared with blood, was the only color on his face. She leaned over, intent on unbuttoning his blood-soaked shirt. At least she’d remove the uniform before Euley arrived. Sounds echoed through the house downstairs as her shaky fingers worked the pewter buttons. Heart-pounding memories of time spent with this man rushed through Emaline.

  Tears filled her eyes and then spilled down her cheek in a chilly passage.

  She swiped away the moisture with a hasty brush of her shoulder and refocused on her task.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Impatience wrenched at Emaline’s emotions.

  Minutes before, Euley had pushed her from the bedroom, urging her to give Brennen a proper farewell. Torn between telling him good-bye and wanting to dash back upstairs to Reece, she paced the weathered boards of the front veranda in frantic steps. Blood smeared in red splotches across her blouse and the material stuck to her skin. Her arms wrapped around her waist and she hugged herself against the chill in the air. A brisk wind swept around the corner of the mansion, bringing the promise of rain ever closer.

  She stopped in front of her brother again.

  “This war can’t last much longer, Em. I just have a gut feeling about it.” He glanced over his shoulder; his men had already galloped out of sight.

  “Don’t go, Bren. Please. Just stay here.”

  He frowned, pulling her into a quick embrace. His words brushed warm across the curve of her ear. “Let’s not start this again, all right?”

  She sighed and folded against her brother, pulling him closer. “Thank you for bringing Reece here.”

  Brennen encircled his arms around her waist, squeezed her tightly and then released her, stepping back. “I’ve put his saber and revolver in the kitchen along with his leathers.” He tromped down the stairs, the warped boards squeaking under the pressure. He shoved his foot into the stirrup and then pulled up into the saddle. Lamplight spilled over him from the open front door. “His buckskin suffered a bad wound on its flank but Tacker said he’d clean it up.” Brennen patted the saddlebags. “And tell Euley thanks for packing up the grub.”

  Emaline nodded, fresh tears welling. He raked back his long hair and then reached over his shoulder and pulled the sweat-stained hat into place. Stiff with dirt and age, the lanyard slid down the front of his jacket. His Morgan sidestepped and Brennen pulled back on the bit.

  “Please be careful,” she whispered.

  “I’m always careful, Em.” He smiled down at her. “You keep remembering that, and just keep on lovin’ your colonel.”

  A nudge to the flank sent the horse into a strong canter.

  Less than an hour after arriving to turn Emaline’s world upside down, her brother disappeared into the darkness, the drumming of his horse’s hooves fading into silence. Another loud crack of thunder resonated overhead. A chilling mist blew over her flushed face and she swerved on her heel and dashed back inside. The door slammed shut behind her just as the clouds ripped apart and released the promised deluge.

  She hiked her work dress to her knees and took the stairs two at a time.

  Another thunderclap rattled the windows as she reentered the master suite. Heavy raindrops pelted the glass panes like pebbles and lightning once again illuminated the room. “They’re gone,” she announced, heading straight to Reece. “How is he?”

  Euley pulled thread from the boiling water with silver tongs, then fished out several sewing needles. “No change. Let’s get started.”

  Emaline nodded, leaning over Reece. His erratic breathing fused with the oppressive panic that scaled the ramparts of her emotions. Reaching into a nearby bucket, she squeezed out water from a scrap of cloth, then swabbed the lingering grit and dried blood from his face. Seeing her brother alive and well brought joy to her heart, but Reece gave it the reason to beat. Indeed, this powerful man, who once wrapped her within his glorious embrace on a soft pine bower and kissed her with a passion she’d never known…this man could not possibly be lying like this before her.

  “You ready, Miz Emaline?”

  “Yes.” She swallowed, hard, and returned the cloth to the bucket before reaching for the needle and thread her servant offered. A quick glance to the side table revealed a bowl holding debris that Euley had already removed from Reece. Emaline resettled her gaze on the jagged wound zigzagging across his chest.

  She inhaled to steady herself then leaned closer. Her hands rested on a defined row of ribs that underscored his loss of several pounds over the past year. Her thoughts settled on the much-repeated task of bringing together the torn, ragged flesh across Reece’s chest. The needle pierced the bloodied skin. The thread slipped through. Every stitch counted. Every stitch different. Every one bringing her closer and closer to another rush of tears.

  She tamped them down and continued.

  Dawn’s light slipped through the break in the curtain to spill in a wash of pinks and yellows across the room. Emaline straightened from the bed and finally laid aside the sewing needle. On the floor beside her lay a pile of rags, bloody testament to a long and harrowing night.

  Bolstered by Euley’s encouraging words, she had finally completed her task.

  “War is cruel,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “Wickedly cruel. And pain-filled. May God forgive those who’ve started this nightmare for they surely didn’t foresee such madness.”

  From across the room, Euley looked up from the bed sheets she was ripping into bandages. “Men don’t look dat far ahead.” She dropped the cotton strips into the boiling pot of water suspended over the low flames. “It’s always been like dat, I’m afraid.” The servant straightened from her task and padded to the bed to stand beside Emaline.

  “There’s nothing honorable in this tragedy.” Emaline ran a hand through her disheveled hair and pushed a dark strand back over her shoulder. “Do you think he’s suffering?”

  “He don’t feel da pain yet. But he will soon.”

  A half-empty morphine bottle stood on the side table waiting for the time when—when, not if—Reece would need it. Her thoughts tumbled backward into last night’s macabre scene. After extracting more slivers of iron, she eased his torn flesh together and sewed closed the wounds. At her elbow, Euley prepared the topical that would cover the score of neat, precise stitches. When Emaline began to place the lint on top of her handiwork, her servant stopped her, a gnarled finger pointing to the boiled water in a nearby bucket.

  “Dip it first, Miz Emaline,” she whispered. “We don’t want no pustulence.”

  A dozen times or more, Doctor Evans had told her laudable pus was acceptable, but she didn’t argue against the woman’s sage advice. Emaline did exactly as Euley instructed. She plunged the lint into the purified water and then applied the dripping aseptic poultice directly to the track of stitches below Reece’s left breast. She then sprinkled additional chloride over the compress, added another dry, medicated poultice and several more clean muslin strips.

  All night long, Euley whispered in her ear, reminding her repeatedly that the colonel was strong, he would survive. All night long, Emaline clung to those words. When her back muscles spasmed from leaning in one position, when tears filled her eyes to break her concentration, when she impatiently swiped them away and refocused on her task, she held fast to that beli
ef. Reece Cutteridge was indeed the strongest man she had ever known, but there was no denying his now-precarious hold on life.

  They had done all they could. His survival solely rested in God’s hands. Her gaze swept his form. The bottom half of his naked body lay hidden, but the thin coverlet seemed out of place across such brawny magnificence.

  Never had Emaline seen a more beautifully formed human.

  She stared past the material that draped his hips, to the place where the hair grew dense and dark and traveled downward under the cloth to his groin. Her eyes shifted away and she swallowed, fighting hard to control the frenetic trip of her heart. She gathered a cloth in her hand.

  Exhaustion eked through her and she nearly swayed.

  Her right hand sought anchor around the bedpost, her left gripped tighter the cloth she held. She stared at his wide shoulders and again contemplated the impact his presence had brought back to her life. Behind her, Euley shuffled around the room, clearing away the bloodied implements she had wielded in the battle against death.

  Only time would tell if Reece would be the victor.

  “I’s carrying dese things downstairs,” Euley mumbled. “Be right back.” The woman disappeared into the hallway.

  Emaline stared at Reece. His pallor worried her. Bandages covered the gashes across his forehead. His hair, unkempt and long, lay in tousled hanks against the pillow. The neatly trimmed beard of her memory was gone, replaced by a full, shaggy growth that spread over the lower half of his face. Dark, sunken shadows hugged the skin beneath his closed eyes, and gaunt indentations shaped the area beneath chiseled cheekbones. A whisper of silver dusted his hair.

  Only his mustache remained the same—a dark chevron that rode the curve of his mouth.

  For just a moment, she allowed the memories, surrendering to the taste and feel of him, the tickling texture that brushed against her skin. Her eyes slipped closed. Her hand tightened on the bedpost. Prickles danced along the column of her throat where his mustache had brushed, his teeth nipping, his tongue savoring, salving the delicate skin near her ear.