“What do you mean?” she said.
I reached over her right shoulder and pointed at the back of the gun. “Most people start thinking about how the gun’s going to jerk up or back when it fires. So they tighten their muscles to keep it steady, but you wind up pulling it off target. Just make sure you breathe; then squeeze the trigger with a slow, steady pull. Go ahead and give it a try.”
She locked her elbows again, and I pulled my hand away. I could see the sight moving all around. She squeezed the trigger, and it clicked. “How was that?” she asked.
“Not bad. Your aim’s a little unsteady, but you’ll get better. Want to try it with a bullet?”
“Sure.”
I loaded the gun and handed it back to her. “Keep the muzzle pointed down until you’re ready to shoot. Never point that thing at anyone or anything you’re not willing to kill.”
She looked up at me with incredulous eyes. “I…I don’t think I can kill anyone.”
“You might surprise yourself if your life’s in danger.”
She turned back to the target, and I stepped behind her again. “Breathe, then squeeze.”
The gun swayed a little, and then she snapped the trigger back. A loud boom echoed off the mountain. She hadn’t even come close. She lowered the gun and turned around. “That was terrible. I could tell.”
“Just relax. Remember to take a breath, and pull the trigger with a steady squeeze.”
She fired the gun five more times with the same result, handing it back to me empty and frowning like she did when she was determined to win an argument with me. “Load it up and tell me what I’m doing wrong.”
I couldn’t help but grin as I slid six more rounds into the revolver. “You’re still anticipating the recoil.”
She took the gun and turned her back to me. Her shoulders rose and fell with her breath. Then she straightened her arms and shot again. This time dirt kicked up just above and to the right of the shirt. “That’s better,” I said. “This time, try to pull the trigger two times, quickly.”
She did as I said, hitting around the shirt. Her arm dropped, and she let out a frustrated sigh. “Why am I so bad at this?”
I turned her shoulders around until she faced me. “Listen, I’ve never seen any obstacle you couldn’t conquer. Apparently, even death. You can do this.”
She cracked a small smile. “Well, I guess it’s a good sign that you can joke about it. Does this mean you forgive me?”
“Let’s not push it.”
She frowned. “In all seriousness, I’m never going to get this. At least, not in the short time we have.”
“You can do this, “ I said, stepping just a bit closer. “Just breathe. Clear your mind.”
“I can’t.”
“Close your eyes. Shut out everything. Even me. Breathe in. Breathe out.” I slowly turned her so she faced the target and moved behind her again. Lowering my voice, I spoke into her ear. “Breathe in. Breathe out. Now open your eyes, find the target, and squeeze.”
She raised her arms and squeezed the trigger in perfect sync, blowing a hole through the shirt. She fired it twice more, emptying the chamber. Then she turned to me with a triumphant smile. “I did it! That worked!”
“Great job,” I said, taking the gun as she handed it back. “I knew you’d get it. Just breathe and squeeze.”
She looked up at me with so much joy that I couldn’t help but smile back. Warmth spread through my chest, and I almost reached for her. Almost. I forced myself to step back and cleared my throat. “Want to try a few more rounds?”
“Sure,” she said.
I loaded the gun once more, and she emptied it into the shirt. Then she shot four more rounds, loading it herself. I was pleased that she’d gotten as much as she could out of one session, so we packed up and headed back to Fort Stotsenburg.
Ruby was quiet as I drove, mostly looking away from me and out into the jungle. I couldn’t read her anymore. I didn’t even know her anymore. And that thought sat in my chest like lead. When we were in sight of the fort, she finally spoke.
“Why did you do this?”
“Do what?”
“Take me out shooting. I thought we’d decided to just do our jobs.”
“And I intend to do just that,” I said as I brought the car to a stop about thirty yards from her tent. “But no matter what’s happened between us, I can’t send you off into Manila defenseless against the Japanese. It just ain’t in me to do that.”
In silence we climbed out of the car and closed the doors, then she looked at me with a sad sort of smile. “Thank you.”
And with that she trudged across the grass toward her tent. But about halfway there, she stopped and stared at an approaching figure who must have said something to her. As the person stepped out from behind a tree, I could see it was Natalie. I couldn’t hear her, but Ruby said something in reply. Then Natalie turned and headed for me.
I realized I’d completely forgotten about her in the past few days, and I felt terrible for it. Especially when she approached me with such a weary, but happy smile. “Wow!” she said. “Nice car!”
“Thanks, but it’s not mine.”
She walked around the front, admiring it as she dragged a finger across the hood. Then she came over next to me and rested her back against the side. “Man, what a crazy few days it’s been here,” she said. “I guess Clark’s been busy too.”
“Very,” I said, taking a quick glance toward the nurse’s tent. Ruby had turned to watch us, and I felt a sudden sense of control.
Natalie shifted her body toward mine, walking her fingers up the buttons of my shirt. “Sure would be nice to relax for a while. I’d give just about anything to be back on the beach with you.”
Nothing inside me moved for this girl, except maybe pity. But my anger at Ruby had not subsided, and that moved me instead. I found myself slipping my arm around her waist and pulling her in for a kiss, letting my frustration drive my lips into hers. She gripped my shirt, pulling just as tightly.
When we separated for a moment, I asked if she wanted to go for a drive. “Sure thing, soldier,” she said with a smile.
As she walked around the front of the car, I took another quick glance toward the tents. Ruby was gone.
Chapter Seven
Ruby
December 13, 1941
I tossed and turned all night, failing to fall asleep before it was time to leave for Manila. No matter how heavy my eyes were, when I closed them, I was confronted with images of bloody limbs being sawn off, men crying out in pain, or Matthew leaning down to kiss Natalie. My body would jolt, waking me repeatedly throughout the night. When I stood from my cot, it was still dark outside, and my head pounded. The earth swayed beneath me. I was exhausted and filthy from head to toe. I desperately needed a bath.
I gathered my helmet and the blanket I’d been issued. Then I considered the gun still stuffed inside the sock Matthew had given me. I hadn’t wanted it at first, for many reasons. It seemed so contrary to my call to help people. But I had to admit a large part of me enjoyed learning to shoot, especially once I caught the hang of it. So I stuffed it inside the blanket and walked over to where the bus was being loaded down with supplies. I stepped inside, but didn’t see any patients. A tall, haggard-looking fellow who seemed to be in charge barked orders as men flung boxes onto the bus. I didn’t exactly know how to tell what rank someone was, so I just said, “Excuse me, sir?”
He didn’t hear me. Or he simply chose to ignore me. I went back down the steps to stand beside him. “Excuse me, sir. Is this the bus headed to Sternberg?”
“Orders have changed,” he said abruptly. “You all are taking the train down to Manila because the roads are so jammed up with people trying to get in and out of the city. Get on the bus, and it’ll take you over to the railroad car.”
He didn’t miss a beat jumping right back to ordering his men around. I figured it was best to stay out of the way, so I found a seat on the bus and waited quiet
ly. But the horizon was already starting to turn silver, and I was afraid we were going to get caught in a bombing raid if we messed around much longer. Another nurse, who I thought was named Laura, climbed on board, along with a medic. I smiled at them both the best I could, and I reckon their returned half-smiles were about the best they could manage too.
The bus rumbled along the road for a couple of kilometers until we reached the train station. I climbed out and could make out the shapes of patients on gurneys being lifted into two boxcars. Stretchers had been placed on racks secured to the walls of the boxcars, and men were stacked three stretchers to a rack. I found Henry in the second car, strapped into the middle section of a group of stretchers.
“Hey, you ready to get a move on?” I said.
He grimaced at me with bloodshot eyes. “Rubes, I’m so glad to see ya. My leg…it don’t feel right. I know it’s messed up bad. Are they gonna take it when I get to Manila? I don’t want to lose my leg. I can’t end up like Daddy.”
I checked his pulse and his temperature. “You’ll be just fine. I’ll get you something to help with the pain. Just hang in there, all right?”
I found another boxcar with supplies, and asked for a few doses of morphine for the patients in pain. Then I went back and gave Henry a dose. Once he was taken care of, I walked around to the other men, checking to see if they needed some as well. Most were already in drug-induced sleep, but one soldier was curled up on his side in a ball, facing the wall. I sat with him a few minutes, but he resisted all offers of help, not even turning to speak to me.
After much scurrying around, securing patients to their stretchers and getting supplies loaded up, we finally began moving toward Manila. By that time, the sun was much higher in the sky than it should’ve been, and I was more than just worried about an attack during our journey. I was certain it was bound to happen.
I tried not to dwell on it too much as we passed through the countryside. I thought of the time when, as a young girl, I had hopped a train between Hanceville and Cullman just so I could help out at the soup kitchen with Matthew. That had been one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life. I remembered sitting on the edge of that boxcar with my legs dangling out, dreaming of seeing the world. Now, as I stood in the middle of a boxcar full of shattered men, I wished for that carefree feeling of possibility. So many lives had been shattered in just a few short days.
The train jerked, the brakes squealing. I stumbled to the open door to figure out what was going on. People ran from the train in all directions, and the sound of the distant buzzing that had haunted my nightmares as well as my days, turned my stomach. I looked north, and sure enough, a large formation of Japanese planes, in their familiar V pattern, were approaching. Behind me, men shrieked to be let out of their stretchers.
“It’s them!”
“Let me out of here! I ain’t dying strapped to a stretcher
The man in the back of the car who hadn’t turned to look at me earlier now looked around the boxcar, laughing hysterically. My head spun as my heart pounded away. What was I supposed to do?
“Ruby!” Henry called. “Cut me loose!”
The medic who’d been in the car with me came over from the door, raising his hands to calm everyone. “No one is going anywhere. You all need to stay in your beds.”
Several of the men swore and kept thrashing at the belts holding them to the stretchers. The buzzing grew louder and louder, filling my head with searing pain. I went over to Henry and did the only thing I knew to do. I took Henry’s hand and knelt beside him, praying as loud as I could over the hum of the planes, which were nearly on top of us then.
“The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised: so shall I be saved from mine enemies.”
I said the verse again, louder this time, feeling its power work peace through my mind. I repeated it a third time, and realized when I’d finished, that the screams around me had been replaced with silence. I stood and looked around. Every man in the car—the patients, the medic, even the young man who’d been laughing—was looking at me with wide, disbelieving eyes.
Then I realized why it was so quiet. The planes were gone.
***
The rest of the ride into Manila was quiet. The men lay on their backs without a word. Some of them moved their lips with their eyes closed, as if they were praying. I went around, checking to see that they hadn’t reinjured themselves, and that they were secured in their stretchers. Each man looked at me in varying degrees of fear or amazement, but I couldn’t figure out why. Did they think my prayer had somehow kept us safe? I had no way to know, but still, I rode the rest of the way near the open door so I could keep an eye on the sky. I didn’t see any more planes, but what I did see was just as terrifying. Black smoke rose from Manila in waves.
Once we arrived at the train station, Henry and the other patients were loaded onto ambulances and carted through the city. I rode with the nurses and other personnel in the back of a truck along roads jammed with Filipinos trying to get into the city, as well as those trying to get out. People pushed carts loaded down with belongings, children, and the elderly. Buildings burned. Bodies were strewn in the streets. Every urge within me wanted to jump out of that truck and do everything I could to help these poor people, but I sat frozen to my seat.
When we neared the hospital, a hazy smog hung over everything. People seemed to be coming to the hospital from all directions—sailors, soldiers, and civilians. The patients we’d brought with us joined the parade of casualties. I stayed with Henry as a couple of enlisted men took him down a crowded hallway and set him on the floor in a room that was already bursting at the seams.
I touched one of the men on the arm, and he turned to me with weary eyes. “Do you know when a surgeon might be able to get to him?” I asked.
He sighed and tossed up his hands. “I can’t say. As soon as possible.”
One of the army nurses came into the room and began checking patients. She looked as drained and shell-shocked as the nurses up at Fort Stotsenburg. I went over to her and did my best not to interrupt her work. “Excuse me, do you know where I could find Mrs. Fincher?”
She nodded, but continued counting the pulse of the man’s wrist she was holding. When she finished, she took a quick glance at me. “She’s managing the operating rooms. We’re overrun.”
“I’ll see if I can find her,” I said. “I’ll be back to help out as soon as I can.”
I followed the signs to the operating rooms and found Mrs. Fincher giving out orders to nurses and service men as they passed by her with stretcher after stretcher. I pushed through the crowd and got as close to her as I could. “Mrs. Fincher,” I called from across the hall. “I’d like to volunteer, if you’ll have me.”
“Goodness, I don’t remember your name, but yes, I believe we can use you. Do you have any surgical experience?”
“Not much. Mostly wound care and recovery. And my name’s Grace.”
“That’ll do.” She pointed to a hallway off to her right. “We need help treating the burn cases. Go down this hallway and take a left. Follow it to the end. You’ll know when you’re in the right place.”
“Is there somewhere for me to stay here at the hospital?”
“Nurse’s quarters are in the back near the gardens. If you can find an empty bed, you’re welcome to use it.”
I thanked her, following her directions and turning left, heading down another long hallway. I wondered how in the world I was going to find my way back to Henry, or to the nurse’s quarters for that matter. Then I realized why she’d said I would know when I was in the right place. The moans and cries were unmistakable. But worse than that was the nauseating stench of burned flesh.
As I neared the end of the hallway, I saw men and women lying on gurneys on both sides of the hall. One Filipino lady held a young boy
of about three in her arms, and she looked up at me with anguished eyes. “Can you help, please?”
I tried to soothe her with a smile and looked down at her wounds. Her arms were charred and peeling away in blisters, the whiteness of bone clearly visible against blackened flesh. “Let me see what I can do.”
She stepped into my path, pleading as though she thought I was her last hope. “No, not for me. See?”
She held the unconscious boy out to me, and I could see his lips were blue. I went into the room to my left, searching frantically for a doctor. “This child out here needs help, now!”
The room was filled with singed bodies wrapped in bandages. A doctor across the room looked up from his patient, and I saw the familiar eyes of Joseph Grant. “Grace!” he called. “I’ll be right there!”
I turned back to the mother and held my hands out to her. “May I take him?”
She grimaced as the boy rolled limply across her injured arms and into mine. I laid him on the gurney she’d been sitting on and checked his vitals. His breathing wasn’t right. I put my head on his chest and listened as best I could over all the wailing and commotion. His heartbeat was faint.
When I straightened, Joseph came along beside me. “He needs oxygen,” I said.
Joseph grabbed the nearest oxygen tank and strapped the nasal cannula into the boy’s nose. We waited for what seemed like an eternity and I wished, not for the first or even hundredth time, that my healing gift had not deserted me. I could feel the boy’s mother pacing behind me as his life drained away. His whole face was turning blue. The oxygen was doing nothing. I turned to Joseph, hoping he’d have answers. “What now?”
He glanced sideways at the mother and lowered his voice. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do. He isn’t going to make it, and there are urgent cases in there.”
“We can’t just give up on him! What about a stimulant?”
Saving Grace: A Novel (Healing Ruby Book 3) Page 10