Hot moisture sprang to Charlotte’s eyes in sympathy as Alice choked on a sob.
Suddenly, the Civil War was not just a headline in the newspaper, a story from a distant land, neatly constrained to narrow columns of black-and-white typeface. With a single telegram, the war invaded their parlor and their lives. Now it was not just news. It was personal, in living color. And it was terrifying.
“When does he go?” Charlotte gently probed.
Blonde ringlets quivered as Alice shook her head. “I don’t know. He just said he’s coming home as planned but will be leaving again for training ‘soon.’ And what about me? I’ll be all alone in that big house with just the servants!”
“You know you can stay here as long as you like,” Caroline crooned.
“No,” said Alice resolutely, looking suddenly years older. “My place is at home.”
Not this time, thought Charlotte as she soothed her little sister. You’re coming with me. She knew better than to say it aloud just yet.
Once Alice was resting comfortably with a cup of tea, Charlotte made her way to the garden behind the house to clear her head. Dappled sunlight filtered through the trees and fell in a lacework pattern on the terraced garden. All the aromas of spring were sharpened in the rain-scrubbed air, lilac blossoms even more pungent than usual. Charlotte carefully perched on the cool stone bench and watched golden daffodils nod their heads in the breeze. Her hoop skirt formed a wide perimeter around her, as if to create a safe distance between her and the world.
When her gaze fell upon weeds crowding the tender shoots of Siberian irises, she felt an irresistible pull to pluck them out herself rather than wait for the gardener to do it. Kneeling on the ground, however, brought her no closer to her goal—yards of fabric and steel hoops were unavoidably in the way.
Bother this contraption! The only way to weed in a hoopskirt, Charlotte surmised, was to lie flat on her stomach and let the hoops flip the skirts straight up at a ridiculous ninety-degree angle to the ground. No, that wouldn’t do at all. With a quick glance around the stone wall–enclosed garden to confirm her privacy, she unfastened her skirt from her waist and bodice, stepped out of it and left it in a dejected pile next to the bench.
Unhindered at last, Charlotte knelt in her petticoats and buried her fingers in the soft, damp soil, relishing the musty smell and digging down deep to uproot the weeds that had taunted her a moment ago. She was so absorbed in her tiny patch of earth that she didn’t hear the French doors to the garden unlatch.
“Why, miss!” Jane gasped, quickly closing the door behind her. “What can you be thinking, down in the dirt, exposed like that for God and everybody!” She scurried to retrieve the discarded skirt.
Charlotte laughed. “It isn’t like you haven’t seen all of us in our petticoats before.”
“No, miss, true enough, but I’ll bet your gentleman caller hasn’t.”
Charlotte gasped. Thoughtlessly, she brushed a strand of hair off her cheek, smudging the porcelain complexion that was the envy of her peers. “Mr. Hastings! I completely forgot.” Charlotte stood, shook the dirt off her undergarments and allowed Jane to help her back into her skirt.
Rushing in from the garden, she ducked into the kitchen and scrubbed the evidence of her unladylike behavior from beneath her fingernails before approaching the tall, handsome visitor waiting in the front hall. One look at his tartan plaid trousers, dark green cravat, frock coat, and top hat told her he had a promenade in mind.
“Aha, so you’ve taken to painting, I see,” he teased.
Charlotte’s hands flew to her cheeks, still flushed from the cool May breeze. Indignation creased her face. She did not appreciate his innuendo that she used rouge—only women “on the town” painted their faces.
Mr. Hastings tilted his head and smiled down at her. “Oh, come now. No need to be cross. I think you look beautiful. So beautiful, in fact, that I’d like to show you off on the Broadway Promenade today. What do you say?” His dark chocolate eyes captured hers, soft and inviting.
“Oh, my hair is a mess, I’ve been out in the garden,” she hedged.
“I thought of that.” Of course he had. His own jet-black hair was smoothly in place, smelling faintly of pomade, his mustache and goatee neatly groomed, as ever. “Would you do me the honor of wearing this?” He picked up a box she hadn’t noticed from the hall table.
“Why, Mr. Hastings—”
“Isn’t it time you called me Phineas?”
She cleared her throat. “Phineas. I can’t imagine what the occasion is.” Hesitantly, she accepted the box from him.
“As the petals are the glory of the rose, the right attire is the glory of a woman,” he said with a flourish.
Parting the tissue paper, Charlotte gently lifted out a pert straw hat trimmed with peacock plumes and a band of satin ribbon in a shocking shade of bright green.
“Well?” His voice was eager, expectant.
Charlotte skimmed a finger over the feathers. “It’s quite … bright, isn’t it?”
His low-pitched laughter rippled over her until she couldn’t help but join in. “Yes, indeed. These new aniline dyes are the latest rage. No one will miss us.”
That much was true. Charlotte managed a nod that she hoped appeared grateful, and excused herself to her dressing room to change into a deep indigo promenade gown with pagoda sleeves and a three-tiered skirt. She hoped it would tame down the peacock feathers in her hat.
Once on Broadway, Charlotte’s unlikely ensemble blended into an eclectic crowd. Coats and dresses of all patterns swarmed around Phineas and Charlotte, the crowd a blur of bright eyes, whiskers, spectacles, hats, bonnets, and caps. Dandies passed by with their hornlike mustaches, kid gloves, thin trouser legs, and patent leather shoes. Smartly dressed ladies in ribbons and silks stepped spritely out of shops, having done their part toward depleting their husbands’ bank accounts with the finest Parisian fashions.
The daily afternoon “promenade” on Broadway had the sound of a leisurely stroll about it, but it was impossible to maintain anything less than a brisk pace to keep from getting run over. The booming city’s major thoroughfare was a profusion of color and a stimulus of excitement. It was hustle, bustle, and squeeze, like a dance of faltering steps to the offbeat tune of thundering omnibuses and the din of a crowd in a hurry. Charlotte would have preferred a stroll in Central Park, if not for the quieter atmosphere, for the fresher air. The musky scent of Phineas’s cologne was soon overpowered, and she was sure her mother and sister would smell on her clothing the horse manure of Broadway when she arrived home.
Phineas, Charlotte could tell, relished being caught in the whirl. His countenance always brightened around luxury and opulence, and here on Broadway, both were displayed en masse in the storefronts lining the avenue. Places like Lord & Taylor and Brooks Brothers usually caught his eye, but today he paused in front of Tiffany & Company, gazing at the dazzling ladies’ jewelry displayed on black velvet, with a firm hold on Charlotte’s small, gloved hand.
“Phineas.” Charlotte tugged gently on his arm. “Did you hear me? I said I’m going to apply to be a nurse.”
He swiveled around to face her. “Pardon me?”
“Yes, a nurse. The W.C.A.R. means to train one hundred New York women to serve as nurses for the army—the army doesn’t have enough, you know—and I mean to be one of them.”
His brow furrowed. “But how would that look?”
“Patriotic,” she said, a little too quickly. “Dutiful. Benevolent. Respectable, too.”
“Just how would it be respectable to have women mixing with large masses of half-naked men?”
“Phineas, listen to me. The most respectable women—and men—of our class are behind this. Reverend Henry Bellows, Dr. Elisah Harris, Mrs. David Dudley Field, Mrs. Henry Baylis, Mrs. Cyrus Field, Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell … all of them.” When he still looked unconvinced, she continued. “The army is simply unprepared to handle the magnitude of what is about to unfold on t
he battlefields. Why not use women who are willing, able, and most eager to serve? Think of it this way. When a doctor or surgeon makes a house call, who takes care of the sick or wounded when the doctor leaves?” She paused. “The women do. The mothers, wives, sisters, sometimes even daughters receive instructions from the doctor or surgeon, clean and dress the wounds, administer the medicines. We are already nurses. This is just moving it to a different setting. Not every soldier’s mother or wife will be able to tend their own. Only a select few will fill that role—but we must have training. Do you see?”
“I don’t like it. I’m afraid most people won’t think about it in the same way. But if you insist on being stubborn about it …”
“It is what I want.” She pinned him with a determined look. She didn’t really need his permission.
Suddenly, a woman in a bright green gown, too low in the neckline for daytime wear, and with a bonnet pushed too far back on her head, sauntered past, leaving behind her a trail of lilac scent so thick Charlotte could taste it.
Charlotte followed Phineas’s gaze in time to see the woman look back over her shoulder and throw him a brazen wink and a smile as bold—and sickening—as the heavy fragrance in which she was drenched. Her cheeks were painted. In a flash, Phineas’s face flamed just as red, but playing around the corners of his mouth was just the hint of a smile.
Chapter Four
Tuesday, April 30, 1861
None of it seemed real to Ruby O’Flannery. The noise was deafening, the glaring sun unfriendly to her weak green eyes. Far more used to shadows, she felt as though she had just stepped into a scene in an overexposed photograph. Thousands of people lined the sidewalks, pushed against windows, or streamed out of doors all along the road. New York City’s Sixty-Ninth Regiment was marching in full uniform to attend mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Mott Street for a blessing from Archbishop John Hughes. It would be the company’s last stop before departing for war. Flags of emerald green fringed with gold, the Irish regiment colors, dotted the churning sea of people. The crush of the unruly crowd frightened Ruby; hundreds were attempting to march alongside the soldiers. She had already lost sight of her husband, Matthew, just one bobbing black felt slouch hat among one thousand others.
The tune of the bugles and the steady beat of the drums changed pitch in Ruby’s ears as her stooped figure was swept farther and farther away from the marching regiment by the surging throngs of spectators. She could hardly comprehend that so many people suddenly supported what Matthew was doing. She was used to jeers, not cheers.
Ruby and Matthew had arrived at the Port of New York in 1850 at the crest of the mass migration to escape Ireland’s Great Famine. While they saw New York as a new beginning, New Yorkers made it clear that the O’Flannerys, along with the thousands of other immigrants who arrived that year, were unwelcome, posting signs on their storefronts reading “IRISH NEED NOT APPLY.”
Now, with the joyful shouts of the masses and the steady rhythm of the marching Sixty-Ninth ringing in her ears, Ruby dared to hope Matthew’s new opportunity and its guaranteed salary was the answer she had been praying for.
Unable to find a spot inside the cathedral, Ruby leaned against the brick wall enclosing the adjacent cemetery outside and smoothed her dark red hair back into place in a tightly coiled bun. The petite woman had been beautiful once, her parents even naming her for the striking color of her hair. But that was a lifetime ago.
“Hey, hunchback!”
Ruby didn’t need to look around to know the brazen child was talking to her. It was true. As an outworker seamstress, unending hours spent bending over her sewing in the poorly lit rooms of her tenement cramped her back and neck muscles so much that she was stooped over even when not working. Her neck bent forward, giving her the appearance either of being in a great hurry when walking or greatly attentive when in conversation.
A ripple of laughter told her that a gaggle of young boys had singled her out as the object of their attention.
“C’mon now, and show us yer arms, tweety!” another boy taunted.
Arms already folded across her chest, she dug her fingers into them as if to keep them from flying up by accident. Like any other hand sewer, her arms had been so trained by holding work up to her eyes that their natural resting position was to bend up from the elbows. The cruel nickname “tweety,” she assumed, was based on her hideous resemblance to a bird with broken wings. She made it a habit to carry something in her arms while walking in public to disguise their unnatural bend. Caught empty-handed, she would fold her arms across her chest or prop her fists on her hips, rather than straighten her elbows, which caused great pain.
From around the corner, a Sister of Charity came and shooed the boys away on threat of putting them in the nuns’ Orphan Asylum. It would have been a step up for the boys’ living conditions, but they scattered anyway.
“Are you all right, my child?” the nun asked Ruby. “Pay those lads no mind. They come from hard homes, you know, with little but the clothes on their backs. You can’t imagine the filth and vermin that share those dark, cramped quarters with them.” Ruby nodded. She understood more than the nun realized. Those boys were her neighbors at the tenement.
“I’m all right, Sister. Just waiting to see if I can catch a glimpse of my husband before he sets off.” Ruby kept her arms crossed. The kind nun nodded and returned to her duties. Taking a deep breath, Ruby lifted her face to the sun. The warmth felt good after another long hard winter. Spring had come again, when she felt like it never would. Of course, this spring was different—this spring had brought with it a war that seemed so far away, but whose fingers had reached up to her city and grasped her neighbors and husband in its mighty grip, pulling them away from her. But the war machine also paid money, for which she was grateful. It had to be wrong to find hope in any aspect of war, but Matthew’s steady income would allow her a respite from the life-draining hours she had been forced to keep lately.
An hour later, the Sixty-Ninth spilled out the front doors and began their march directly to the ferry that would take them to Annapolis for their first mission of guard duty. Ruby scanned the uniformed men for a final glimpse of her husband.
The crowd continued to push past her, almost knocking her down. A strong grip on her shoulder spun her around.
“Don’t you have any work to do?” Matthew suddenly stood over her. His brawny form, the evidence of long hours spent building bridges and hauling rocks, stretched the fibers of his ill-fitting Union greatcoat. His blue eyes flashed with their usual intensity, his ruddy cheeks flushed with both anticipation of war and the heat of the packed sanctuary he had just come from.
His absurd question stung Ruby as much as his drunken slaps. She usually worked fifteen hours a day from their dank tenement dwelling, sewing cuffs, buttonholes, and sleeves of bleached muslin for Davis & Company, but work always surged in April as the garment manufacturer rushed summer styles to Western and Southern suppliers. She could easily count on eighteen hours most days this month, earning her between seventy-five cents and $1.50 per week. She knew exactly how much work awaited her and needed no reminding.
“Can’t a woman see her husband off to war?” Ruby replied. A rash of heat radiated from her collar to her chin.
Matthew shook his head. “Soon’s I get my paycheck, I’ll be sending it on home to you, but in the meantime, you are supporting yourself.”
Time and pain had chipped away the luxury of common courtesy and kindness, but Ruby knew he wouldn’t let his wife go hungry if he could help it.
“This is a new start for us, Ruby.” His voice was edged with determination.
And then he was gone, as suddenly as he had appeared, lost again in the formation of soldiers filing down the street on their way to the ferry.
Ruby stood frozen in place. Something about his farewell haunted her. “A new start,” he had said. Yes, that was it. That’s what he had said when they immigrated to New York, and yet they had still struggled, just
in new ways, to survive. That’s what he had said when they learned they were going to have a child, both times, and now they had none. Was she still a mother if her children were dead? She pressed calloused and pinpricked fingertips against her eyelids, as if she could close her mind’s eye to the horrific images her memory now dredged up. She needed to sit down.
Chin tucked down, Ruby fought her way back to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and stepped through the two sets of massive double doors. As the muffled din of the retreating crowd faded, she sank down into the last pew. Her slight shoulders shook with silent sobs that racked her entire body.
Spent at last, she looked up. Stained glass windows on the sides of the church depicted stories from the Bible, while the windows at the front of the nave cast the light in shades of blue and green. Thick, red carpeting created a path from the middle aisle up the stone steps to where the archbishop had said mass a short time ago. The ceiling was so tall her gaze followed it up until it pointed her to the heavens.
Rarely was she in a place this magnificent. Catholic churches, like Catholic immigrants, faced hard times in New York City, too, prompting them to charge an admission fee to enter, and to rent the front pews to the upper- and middle-class as another marker of their wealth. Ruby had been told that the brick wall enclosing the Cathedral and cemetery was to prevent mob violence from anti-Catholics, but she had always thought of it as yet another barrier between her and God.
Today, however, she relished being here. She felt like she should pray, but all she knew from her childhood was the Hail Mary. “Hail Mary, full of grace,” she started, slipping to her knees and gently rocking back and forth as she had done as a girl. “The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.”
Wedded to War Page 4