by Kathy Otten
For those moments, there was no clopping of horse feet, no moans of the wounded, no Robbie. There was only the aching need to be held, to be cherished, to be loved. The yearning to feel the warmth of his bare skin pressed against hers. Her legs tangled with his. She reached down and tugged the bottom of his shirt from the waistband of his pants. Seeking more of him, her hand slid into the hollow at the base of his spine. Her fingertips slid lower, as far as the tightness of the clothing allowed, and brushed over the curve of his buttocks, grazing the top of the crease.
She’d almost forgotten about his burned back, about all those who could turn their way at any moment, and about Robbie.
Poor Robbie. She pressed her hand against Jason’s chest, and he rolled off to sit beside her, one knee drawn up on which to rest his arm.
She sat up and brushed at her clothes to keep her trembling fingers occupied. “’Tis not the time,” she murmured checking her hair at the back of her head, making sure her bun hadn’t come loose. “Ye are a doctor, and I be a nurse.”
“Yes.” He rolled to his feet. “I’d almost forgotten you’d come looking for a doctor.”
He offered his hand. She accepted, and he pulled her up, though the sarcasm in his tone confused her.
“Can ye not come and look at Robbie now?”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry.” His hand trembled, and he rubbed it over the back of his neck.
“Even if I could manage to examine the wound without…another…episode, I only have one good hand for a surgery that requires precision.”
“I can help. And Captain Breen.”
“Gracie, I will need two assistants including you, surgeons who could be using their skills on men who can be saved. Send him to Washington. Let a more capable surgeon operate.”
She bit her lip and shook her head. “Please, ye have to come.”
“Young men die, Mrs. McBride. You can’t fix everything.”
“Do ye think I do not know that? Two o’ me brothers died at Marye’s Heights, the cry o’ the Irish Brigade on their lips. I could do nothing to stop their lifeblood from seeping into the mud. William died, calling me name while I searched Boston for someone to come and save him. But this is Robbie, and by the saints I will not stand by and do naught.”
“There’s nothing I can do. When you pushed aside his hair, did you notice the depression above his ear? A piece of the skull has been pushed into the brain. He requires surgery in a hospital. Not here in the middle of a field.”
“But ye have skills and knowledge I’ve seen in no other.”
He shook his head. “Removing tiny pieces of skull is difficult surgery. Regardless, even when performed under optimal conditions, there is a sixty-one percent fatality rate. Assuming the patient survives transportation back to Washington. Even then patients often succumb to secondary brain fever and seizures. Survival is minimal at best. I’m sorry, Gracie. I know you care for the young man, but I can’t save them all.”
She grabbed his bare forearm, her pinky brushing the soft cotton of his rolled shirt sleeve, and held tight. Desperate, she searched his face. “Doctor. Jason. Ye have to try. Please.” Tears clogged her throat. “Robbie is yer brother.”
Chapter Eighteen
Brother.
The word slammed into his chest with the impact of an artillery blast, except there was no pain. Only icy numbness. He stared at Gracie, then past her shoulder to the wounded. So many wounded lying on the ground, left to die, alone, in pain, and afraid. Among them his brother.
Beyond, rose the pointed mounds of white tents protecting those who could be saved. What gave him the right, what gave any of them the right to play God? And damn God for forcing him, or any of them, into the chaos and destruction of war with limited knowledge and instruments.
A bird darted across, a black streak against the bleakness before him.
He studied the scene with the same intensity he gave an anatomy drawing in a book. His existence at that moment drifted into the surreal, as if he stood apart from the picture before him and could simply turn back the page to give his life the certainty it held before.
Before Gracie.
Before the chaos.
Fingers pressed heavily into the flesh of his forearm. He looked down. Wide brown eyes stared up at him. Her mouth moved, but oddly he heard nothing. Now she was shaking his arm. Pain pulled at the skin and muscle of the burn on his back. With a jerk, he wrenched his arm away.
“But ye have to come.”
He heard that, heard the plea in her soft lilting tone.
“Ye be the only one who can save him.”
Him?
Ah, yes. Reid. Head wound. He squeezed his eyes tight and rubbed his good hand over his face.
His brother.
Drawing a deep breath, he studied her features. Shadows underscored her tear-filled eyes. Soot and a streak of mud smeared across those intriguing freckles that dusted her skin.
“Chaos, Mrs. McBride. I specifically asked you not to introduce more chaos to my life. Announcing I have a brother is chaos.”
“Aye. And ’tis sorry I am to be telling ye this way, but I did not know Robbie would be here. Please, can we not talk o’this later?”
“May I ask how a note inside my old rabbit led you to this revelation?”
She turned for a moment, back toward the wounded, then sighed and raised her chin to meet his gaze.
“’Twas Robbie’s uncle Mark be telling me.”
“And who is Uncle Mark?”
“Sergeant Baker. Yer tracheotomy patient.” She took two steps back, as if she expected him to maintain the distance and take two steps forward.
He would not be so easily manipulated.
“After ye left, Sergeant Baker wanted to thank ye for saving his life. He insisted yer name be Doctor Reid. That ye looked the image of his old friend and brother-in-law, Jonathan Reid.”
Gracie shot a quick glance over her shoulder and inched back another step.
A funny ache settled inside his chest. He rubbed at it and frowned trying to assimilate the information. “I will hear it all. Now.”
She flinched at the harshness of his tone.
“Jonathan Reid married Sergeant Baker’s sister. She was in the family way with Robbie when Jonathan took their son on a trip to Philadelphia. They never returned. That little boy’s name was—Jason.”
His whole world tilted as his very existence flipped upside down. The pain in his chest turned to ice. He rubbed harder at the spot as his heart pounded erratically beneath his sternum. He gasped for air, panting for each subsequent breath as he tried to think.
Gracie was beside him, holding his hand, rubbing his back, speaking to him as he tried to breathe.
He tried to slow his breathing. Inhale. Calm. Exhale. Calm. Gracie was speaking. Focus. A brother. He had a family? None of this was real.
In that moment, had no idea who he was, how to feel, or what to think. He only knew he couldn’t stand idle any longer. He needed to move, to be busy, to concentrate on something that would consume all his attention. Except, he couldn’t think what that would be.
“Please, help Robbie.”
My name is Jason. Charles is dead.
A brother.
He had a brother.
He looked deep into her eyes. How the hell could he do this? Operate on such a head wound, in a field hospital, with one good arm, and panic that threatened to consume him at any moment. Remorse tugged down the corners of his mouth.
Why did she have to look at him like that, like a bedraggled puppy shivering in the rain?
He sighed. “All right.”
Even as he said the words, even as hope lit a sparkle in her eyes, doubt like an eerie fog, seeped through the recesses of his mind, clouding his usual confidence. There was so much about medicine, about the human body, he didn’t understand.
“Find some men with a litter and have him transported to the surgery tent. Then shave that area of his head, mindful not to apply any
pressure to that depression in his skull.”
Perhaps if all the blood was gone he could manage this.
She smiled. “Thank ye, Doctor.”
He nodded and watched her hurry off. She might not want him as a man, but as a doctor she gazed up at him as if he were God’s own cousin. What if that idolization was all he’d ever have from her? Could he risk breaking that tenuous connection if another nervous attack like the one at Fredericksburg, sent him running, leaving Robbie to bleed on the table?
Gracie had lost so many, her brothers, her husband, that young drummer boy. Even if he performed the surgery, the probability of survival was slim. If Corporal Reid died, if his own brother died, would she blame him? Would he blame himself? Would that glow of adulation in her eyes darken into hate?
She’d certainly hate him if he didn’t try. He’d hate himself if he didn’t try.
He held out his hands. Visual conformation of what he already knew. His hands were shaking.
He curled his fingers into fists and went in search of Richards. He found him at the cook tent and sent him off to locate his field pack.
While he was here, he poured a cup of hot coffee. One of the men had been roasting the beans brought down by the Sanitary Commission, and he’d smelled their charred sweetness all morning.
Whether he told himself he needed a cup to steady his hands or to ease the hollowness in his belly, deep down he knew it was an excuse.
Avoidance was not his way. Shame crept up his spine as he swallowed gulps of the hot brew, and glared at anyone who dared look his way.
Richards strode toward him carrying the field pack.
Somewhat fortified, he tossed the cup in the bin of dirty dishes and pulled the trephine kit—which he hoped he didn’t need—from the bottom of his pack.
Trephining, if absolutely necessary, was an outdated surgical procedure, but if he couldn’t remove the pieces of bone, he’d be forced to try.
With the box tucked under his arm, he strode toward the surgery tent. No point in procrastinating. In an hour he’d be working on his next patient and the fate of young Corporal Reid, his brother, would be left to God.
Gracie paced outside the surgery tent. She turned as he approached and met his gaze. Though she stopped moving, tension radiated from her body.
Neither said a word as she followed him inside. Robbie’s stretcher had been placed on a table toward the back. Someone had covered the young corporal with a sheet. Probably Gracie, so he didn’t have to look at the blood-soaked uniform.
Robbie’s head had been positioned so his face was turned away and the wound was presented up.
Across the tent, Major Andrews looked up from his patient and frowned. Though his disapproval was obvious, he said nothing.
Jason’s instruments had been laid out on the same small table he’d been using all day. He opened the trephine kit and set what he might need beside the scalpels and forceps.
He exhaled a shaky breath and swallowed. He wiped his hands on a square of linen and nodded to Breen, who came to stand on his left side.
With the area shaved clear, two separate wounds were revealed. A long furrow cut across the scalp from an inch above the temple, along the side of the head. Most likely a minié ball, and the source of all the blood.
His pulse thrummed in his ears. He drew a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Focus.
The second wound, the depressed portion of the skull, appeared to be the result of some impact to the head. Irregular in shape. Approximately one inch at the widest point. If he were to speculate, he would presume the first injury caused a fall onto a rock, or judging by the triangular shape, perhaps the corner of his own rifle stock.
Leaning close, he used his fingers to separate the skin of the first. Blood leaked from the wound. The familiar tightness pulled at the muscles across his chest.
Inhale. Exhale. Breathe.
Gracie’s hand moved in with sponges to absorb the blood.
The skull appeared intact. No fractures here. Breen could stitch it closed later.
He shifted his attention to the second wound, the depression above the ear. Surprisingly, the impact of the injury hadn’t broken the skin. He lightly brushed his finger around the edges of the irregular shape.
Hoping for the best, he accepted the scalpel Gracie passed him. Using his lightest pressure, he sliced through the skin, making an X which extended beyond the perimeter of the indentation.
Silent in her efficiency, Gracie stood poised with her sponges as Breen reached over and folded back the triangular flaps of skin.
Blood spread out across the cobblestones. A man lay with his head split open.
His heart pounded. Each breath grew more shallow.
A hand squeezed his arm. He glanced down at the pressure and met Gracie’s eyes—wide, brown, and trusting. She trusted him to do what needed to be done.
She was emotionally vested in the young corporal, yet she stood calm and composed, not crying or wringing her hands. Could he do no less?
Focus. He drew a deep breath and released it in a long sigh.
Gracie passed him the forceps. “Think of something else,” she whispered.
He began lightly picking detached bone splinters from the edges of the depression.
“I didn’t understand the humor.” So far there was no evidence the fragments had penetrated the dura mater.
“What?”
Tiny, uneven shards of bone had left a jagged edge around the hole where the piece of skull had been. “Rongeur.”
Gracie shook her head.
“Hey’s saw,” Breen whispered.
Gracie’s hand hovered for a moment over two instruments about the size of a toothbrush.
Charles grabbed the smaller one.
“Why is it deemed funny for a man to run back into enemy fire to retrieve something of so little value.”
“Are ye speaking o’ the joke ye told me?”
“Correct.” He smoothed off the jagged edges as Breen cleaned the area with a bone brush.
“’Twas funny because he’s Irish.”
Along the thin fracture line, a small piece of bone pushed down below the edge of the skull but hadn’t broken off completely, so it was impossible to lift out.
He’d hoped this wouldn’t be necessary. He’d only done this procedure once and that had been on a cadaver. He raised his head and blew out a sigh.
Breen met his gaze. Understanding filled his brown eyes. He gave a slight nod.
“Trephine.”
Either Gracie knew which instrument it was, or she’d made an educated guess, but she silently passed him the T-shaped instrument, pressing the wooden handle against his open palm.
Before beginning, he adjusted the perforator pin, lowering it from the shaft to slightly below the circle of teeth at the bottom of the drum-like cutting head, then locked it in place with a side screw.
Holding the trephine perpendicular to the skull, he centered the pin over the area of bone he needed to remove. Turning the handle, he rotated the cutting head until he’d made a circular groove which stopped short of reaching the membrane which protected the brain. He retracted the pin up into the shaft.
As he set the trephine on the table, Breen brushed away the fine bone dust.
“Elevator.”
Gracie searched the table then passed him the thin instrument with the ebony handle.
“Hmm. So an Irishman running through Confederate lines to retrieve his flask is humorous.” He slid the elevator between the brain membrane and the piece of bone, then lifted it high enough to grab with the forceps.
Breen chuckled. “That is funny.”
“In Gaelic, whiskey is called uisce beatha, the water of life. ’Tis a source o’pride. The whiskey we make, and a man’s ability to drink it.”
Whether the joke was humorous or not, thinking of it had returned his breathing and heartbeat to normal. “Lenticular.”
Gracie passed him the slim knife, smooth on the bottom and rough o
n top. He slipped it between the brain membrane and skull and followed the rim of the hole to even out any rough areas along the underside.
The dura mater showed no bulging or other evidence of hematoma, but evidence of a slow bleed could present itself later. He decided to wrap it well and let the surgeons in Washington either drain it or cover the area with a wax plug or lead plate.
“Let’s stitch the first wound and wrap this up with a good thick bandage.” Breen threaded the needle and passed it to Jason.
Gracie hovered until Jason stepped away from the table to wash off his hands.
Without a word she stepped close and slid her arms around his waist, her cheek pressed against his chest, just above his apron. She hugged him tight, but before he thought to wrap his arms around her, she stepped back and looked up, meeting his gaze. “He will be all right now?”
Jason gave his fingers a quick shake and dried his hands on the closest towel.
He hated the expectation in her eyes. Even as the drummer boy lay dying, she’d claimed there was always hope. He could repeat the grim statistics for the survival from a wound like this, but maybe he’d spent too much time with Gracie and her enthusiasm for life, or perhaps it was because this young man, tall and lanky with brown hair and blue eyes was his brother, and he needed that bit of hope for himself, but he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Maybe.”
****
Rain pelted down in earnest that evening, thudding against the canvas, washing through the trees.
Gracie had spent as much time as possible that afternoon near Robbie, whispering words of encouragement, holding his hand. Doctor Ellard—it was hard to think of him as Jason Reid—had come by a couple of times to check on him, but he hadn’t said much.
Now, kettles in hand, she darted through the rain, from tent to tent, serving beef tea and farina to the men well enough to eat. Once her kettles were empty, she tugged her hat low and dashed toward the cook tent for refills.
“Gracie!”
She skidded to a stop and whirled toward the voice. Captain Breen slogged toward her through the mud. Rain dripped from the brim of his hat and slid shiny and black down his rubberized poncho.