Beyond All Price

by Carolyn Poling Schriber

  “Yes, he will. And that’s not my fault—nor yours. Damn fools sign up for war without a thought of whether they can handle the conditions, and more damn fools let sick men enlist, just to fill up the ranks. Begging your pardon, Mrs. Leath, my language tends to slip when I’m faced with abject stupidity!”

  “What about Private Moffatt? Should he be back there with him? Couldn’t he catch it?”

  “Yes, probably. But he tells me he’s been caring for the patient for several days. If he’s going to get consumption himself, it’s already too late. Might as well let him handle the case rather than expose someone else.”

  “And if we have two deaths, then?” Nellie couldn’t help but be furious at the doctor for his cavalier attitude.

  “Then we have two splashes as we bury them at sea. Men are going to die, Nellie. I’ve warned you of that, and you’ve seen it already. Herr Vliet over there won’t make it through the night. Our own Mathias Crowl, the other typhoid patient, will follow him sooner or later. Moffatt and Reynolds have a while longer to wait. Maybe they’ll even make it back to dry land, if any of us do. That’s what war is all about. There’ll be as many deaths from accident and disease as there are from bullets, but military minds will explain away those deaths as heroic sacrifices. And of course Reverend Browne will inform us all deaths are predestined. In the meantime, I’m supposed to work miracles and save lives! Bah!” He slammed his fist on the table and stomped as far as the door before turning.

  “I’m sorry, Nellie. Didn’t mean to get on a soapbox and yell at you. You stepped between me and my frustration at the limitations of medicine. We should be looking for cures for diseases, not helping to spread them though military invasions.”

  “I understand, Sir. And I didn’t mean to criticize you. It’s hard—harder than I expected. I can handle the physical work, but the emotional demands are a different matter.” She stopped as she felt tears begin to brim behind her eyelids.

  “We do what we can, Nellie. Come on. It’s time for dinner, and you know it’s a long time between meals on this ship.”

  The mess cabin was already crowded by the time they made their way to the lower deck, and Reverend Browne was about to offer a prayer. Nellie slipped into her seat quietly, grateful for a few moments to compose herself before having to make polite conversation with her table mates. Her relief did not last long.

  “Let us pray,” commanded Reverend Browne in his booming preacher’s voice. “Heavenly Father, we come here today humbly ashamed at the corruption that has seeped into our midst. We have forgotten the lessons of our earthly fathers and mothers. We have allowed greed and lasciviousness to enter our hearts. We have openly defied Thy laws and commandments. We are but depraved beasts, indulging our worst instincts and desires. We have strayed ourselves and then lured others to stray with us. We are humbly contrite and beg Thy forgiveness for our manifold sins.”

  “What on earth is he talking about!” Nellie wondered. “What has happened?”

  “Father, we ask Thy forgiveness for allowing a corrupt and evil woman to come into our company. She has lured us with her wiles and tempted us with her blandishments. She has offered to teach us lessons no one should learn. Like Eve, she has taken the apple from the serpent and offered it to us. And we, poor weak creatures that we are, have bitten into its forbidden flesh. Forgive us for not heeding the lesson Adam’s fate should have taught us.”

  No, no, no! Nellie thought. He can’t be talking about me. But she knew he was.

  “Father, we pray that Thou wilt give wisdom to the young men here, who may be lured into temptation by the promise of secret skills and the prospect of easy money. Let them understand gambling and card playing are tools of the Devil. We pray Thou wilt give strength to the officers of this regiment, that they may stand before their men and witness to the evils of poker and faro and other card games. Give us all the courage to resist when the voice of Jezebel summons us into sin.”

  Well, which is it? Eve? Or Jezebel, indeed! Nelly could feel the hot waves of anger spreading over her face, leaving it red and blotched.

  “Heavenly Father, we confess all men are totally depraved. We know without Thy mercy, no one of us is worthy of salvation. And we know Thy Grace is bestowed upon us unconditionally. If it were not so, not one of us would be saved. We understand Christ’s atonement for our sins is limited by Thy will. And we know if we are among the few who have been predestined to join Thee some day in Heaven, we will not be able to resist the bestowing of that great blessing. Therefore, Father, help us to persevere in our faith, believing in all Thou hast taught us. Now grant us the power to go on with our lives, doing Thy will above all others. Bless this food to our use and our bodies to Thy service. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

  A subdued mumble of “Amens” responded, interspersed with an audible intake of breath as the assembled group struggled to absorb the diatribe to which they had been subjected. Nellie looked up, dreading the sneers she expected to see. Instead, everyone seemed to be busily looking elsewhere. Not a single eye caught hers. They’re embarrassed, she realized, although the thought did not help much. As the bowls and platters were passed, she took little to fill her plate, for the accusatory prayer had killed her appetite. Her mouth was so dry that the beans stuck to her palate, and the meat became unchewable. She pushed the food around her plate, trying to make it look as if she were eating something.

  As soon as possible, she excused herself and scurried back toward sick bay, which, she was beginning to realize, had become her only hiding place. As she reached the first gangway, a voice behind her called out, “Mrs. Leath. Please, wait a moment.” Nellie turned to see Mrs. Pollock, the youngest of the other women in the regiment. Nellie stared at her, unwilling or unable to say a word.

  “Please, I wanted to . . . to say something to . . . to let you know not everybody agrees with Reverend Browne.”

  “But everyone knows what he thinks of me, don’t they?”

  “Well, he certainly doesn’t hide his feelings, but I think he’s being really ridiculous.”

  “Do you?”

  “Of course I do! So do lots of other people.”

  “I haven’t seen many signs of sympathy.”

  “Perhaps not, but it’s there, all the same. My father says. . . .”

  “Your father?”

  “Yes. Captain Samuel Bentley, of Company E, is my father. Anyway, he says you had a top-notch idea. He told me he wished you had given a few lessons to some of his boys.”

  “Really! I apologize. I hadn’t made the connection. You were introduced as Mrs. Pollock, and I didn’t know. . . .”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’d rather you called me Mary, anyway.”

  “All right, and I’m Nellie. But your husband is. . . .”

  “Dead, at Manassas.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry!”

  Mary drew a deep breath, lifted her chin, and managed a wavering smile. “I can almost say it without breaking down by now. What about yours?”

  “A blighter, I’m afraid. The last time I saw him, he was planning to open a brothel for soldiers on leave. When he was trying to talk me into becoming the madame of the house, he kept telling me we ought to make a small fortune from this war. The only thing I could think of to do—to make up for his crassness—was to sign up myself.”

  Mary swallowed a laugh of surprise. “Has he made a go of it?”

  “I don’t think so. I recently received another letter telling me he had signed on as a musician with an Ohio regiment. Probably plans to fleece the soldiers with card tricks. But please don’t tell Reverend Browne!”

  The two women chuckled together, and with that small bond, a friendship was born. “I’m coming back to sick bay with you,” Mary said. “I heard you had a pack full of patients, and none of us have been helpful up to this point.”

  “I could use some help,” Nellie agreed. “I can use a friend even more.”

  With Mary’s help, Nellie soon had her patients fed, washed, and
settled in for the evening. The two young women smiled at each other as they relaxed for a few moments. “I still don’t understand what all that praying was about,” Nellie confessed. “Oh, I know the good reverend has a vendetta out against all card players, but there seemed to be much more than that going on. What was I missing?”

  “You’re not a Presbyterian, are you?”

  “No. At home, we attended the Episcopal church, which is pretty intense on ritual and liturgy. But all that stuff about Grace and Predestination was beyond my understanding.”

  “Well, basically, he was reading all of us a lesson straight out of John Calvin—things we were taught as children in Sunday School. I thought I had heard the last of TULIP long ago.”

  “Tulip? What on earth is that?”

  Mary held up one hand and labeled her fingers T-U-L-I-P. Then she ticked them off, one by one. “These are the basic tenets of Calvinism: Total depravity, Unconditional election, Limited atonement, Irresistible grace, and Perseverance in faith. TULIP. The whole prayer was a Sunday School lecture and a scolding from the preacher because we grown-up children had forgotten our catechism.”

  “I thought it was directed at me alone.”

  “In one way, you were the target, but the implication was we are all sinners, complicit in your sin. Everyone was embarrassed, and more than a few were angry at his tone. Reverend Browne may have done you a favor. You’ll find a great deal more sympathy now. I’d be willing to bet on it!”

  “Please don’t!” Nellie laughed. “You’ll earn us both another tongue-lashing.”

  ggg

  9

  Hurricane

  The first of November dawned still and heavy. No wind stirred the few sails the Ocean Queen still unfurled. They drooped like wet rags from the rigging, serving only to capture the sooty smoke that issued from the engine stack and then hung in the air. The ocean lay flat, oily and thick. No fish broke the surface to snag a bug, for there were no bugs flying above the still water. The damp air itself pressed down on the shoulders of those few sailors moving about on the deck.

  Nellie looked about uneasily. Her eyes tracked the horizon, looking for the ominous line of clouds she was almost certain she would see. Only a faint darkening of the southern horizon warned of trouble to come, but Nellie recognized the signs. “There’s a storm brewing, isn’t there?” she asked a young captain’s mate.

  “Could be, M’am. Feels like there’s something getting ready to happen, but I don’t know what. Never been this far south.”

  “Nor have I, Mr. Quentin, but if I were at home, I’d be calling this hurricane weather.”

  “Surely not, Mrs. Leath. Too late in the year for hurricanes. It’s November, mind.”

  “And I take it you’ve not spent much time in New England!” Nellie replied. “This is exactly the time of year storms come barreling in off the Atlantic and smash the coast of Maine. I’ve been there all too often.”

  “But we’re off the coast of North Carolina, not Maine,” the young sailor explained with exaggerated patience.

  “Those New England storms have to come from somewhere,” Nellie said. Then she shook her head in exasperation and headed to her duties in the sick bay. We’ll know soon enough, she thought.

  Her patients, too, seemed to sense something different in the air. “Is it awfully warm out, Miss?” one young soldier asked. “I know yesterday was Halloween, and back home it’d be cold out. But I’m sweating. Does that mean I’m really sick?”

  “No, Private Gill, it really is warm out, and there’s no breeze to help the air circulate down here below the main deck. I don’t think you’re running a fever at all,” she added, laying her hand on his temple. “In fact, your complaint is a good sign. You’re alert enough to be aware of the changes in the weather. Your bout of influenza seems to have about run its course.” Nellie smiled at him and moved on.

  Other patients were unusually restless, though less articulate about their discomforts. Nellie moved among the injury cases, tarrying over each one long enough to assure herself the wounds were healing and were not displaying signs of infection. The discomforts of the measles cases called for gentle sponge baths, which occupied Nellie for much of the morning. She postponed her visit to her typhoid patient, Mathias Crowl, for as long as she could, knowing he was beyond knowing or caring what was done to him. Like the German patient, Jasper Vliet, he was delirious much of the time now, muttering to himself and twitching in response to invisible annoyances. His hearing had deteriorated, and talking to him had little effect. He had slipped downward toward the foot of his bunk, as if withdrawing from the world—as indeed he was.

  “Nurse Leath,” called Doctor Ludington.

  “Yes, Sir,” she answered, hurrying toward the curtained area that shielded Private Reynolds and his case of consumption from the rest of the patients.

  “Don’t come in here,” he warned. “I just need you to set up some equipment. Could you find a small sponge, a shallow cup, and a piece of flexible tubing? I think I have the tubing in my medical case, and any kind of soft spongy material will do. I want to make an inhaler for this patient. Oh, and while you’re looking in my case, see if you can find a small stoppered bottle labeled as ‘anti- hemorrhagic’ inhalant.”

  Nellie’s face, lined with concern as she had moved from patient to patient, brightened a bit with the possibility something could be done for Bob Reynolds. She watched with fascination as the doctor pressed cotton wool into a metal cup and then dribbled a couple of teaspoonfuls of a darkish liquid into the wool. Tucking one end of the flexible tube into the bottom of the cup, he held the other end to the patient’s lips and instructed, “Take deep breaths through your mouth, Robert.” The young man choked a bit with his first breath, and then settled into a rhythmic pattern of deep inhalations. The strain on his face eased, and he leaned back on his pillow, eyes closed in relief.

  “What’s in that?” Nellie asked.

  “Witch-hazel, black cohosh, and creosote, among other things. Works wonders when the patient is bleeding from the lungs. It won’t cure him, of course, but it dulls the pain and eases the chest.”

  “Another remedy for my notebook,” she commented.

  “Still keeping it up?”

  “Oh, yes. That was a wonderful suggestion. I want to learn as much as I can. And you’re kind to take the time to explain things to me. Some of the other doctors don’t like being questioned, I’ve noticed.”

  “The more you know, the more help you’ll be, I figure. Now, why don’t you take a break, go topside, and see if you can find out what’s making this old tub of a ship rock. If it gets much rougher, we’re going to have to start strapping the patients to their bunks.”

  Nellie realized for the first time how badly the ship was tossing. The rhythmic rise and fall of the deck had been increasing in intensity for some time, but Nellie had been too busy to notice. Used to the pitching of her uncle’s fishing boats, she had simply planted her feet a bit further apart and adjusted unconsciously to the motion.

  Now, as she made her way up the gangway ladder to the main deck, she caught her breath with surprise. The wind, nonexistent at breakfast, was now blowing strongly out of the southeast. Looking far southward, Nellie could see a bank of clouds filling the eastern half of the horizon. An unusually straight-sided wall of cloud separated this bank from the wispy clouds that spread westward from it. Nellie’s heart plummeted. She was staring straight into the wall of a hurricane, still far out at sea, but judging from the wind direction, likely to be moving directly into the path of the fleet.

  The same young mate she had talked to that morning was passing by. “What say you now, Mr. Quentin?” she called to him.

  “Oh, it’s you again. Still don’t think you’re gonna get a hurricane, M’am. This is just a bit of a blow. Those of us used to the sea have seen lots worse. Why, I could tell you stories of wave so high that. . . .”