by Ward, Marsha
“Ben,” she said, a bit timidly. “You will have to shuck your britches.”
“The devil you say!”
“I cannot see the wound. I am sorry, but if I cannot see it, I cannot find the ball to remove it.”
Ben shook his head. “No. Get me under a roof and bring me something to wrap about myself, and I’ll decide then what course to take.”
“You are so stubborn,” she declared, sighing.
“I’ve quit bleedin’. Help me rise, and shelter me in the shed or the stable.” He held up his arm to be steadied by her. “Besides, you have no instruments here.”
“All right. The old nursery shed is closest.” She picked up the pistol, uncocked it, then helped him rise. “Lean on me, Ben. I can bear your weight.”
“I doubt it.”
“Yes I can. I have had lots of practice walking men about in the hospital.”
She grunted a bit when he slung his arm around her shoulder and leaned on her. Despite his sleep, he was exhausted, and panted with the exertion of forward movement.
“Are you still in pain?” she asked a bit later as she bore him slowly along.
“A mite,” he lied through gritted teeth, trying to use the rifle as a crutch. “Some little bit,” he amended after a few more steps. As they neared the goal, he finally admitted, “More than I’d like to say.”
“Oh Ben,” she wailed, then tsked several times with her tongue. “Do not tell me lies. I must know your state before I endeavor to fish out the ball.”
“You’re not a surgeon, Ella Ruth.”
“No, but I have seen many balls removed from wounds by my uncle and other surgeons. I believe I can do the task.” She propped him against a work bench used in former times to prepare apple grafts. “Hold onto that rail,” she commanded. “I shall return in no time at all with assistance.”
“Leave me the pistol,” he said. “It looks heavy.”
“It is heavy, and I can shoot it,” she said, and kept it with her as she hurried off.
Ben sank into a semi-dazed state while he waited for her to return. Perhaps she would think better of her plan and bring someone else to perform a surgery on him. Or mayhap she would find a vehicle to cart him to the hospital, if it wasn’t within Yankee lines now.
After a time that seemed interminable, Ella Ruth came back with her arms full, but no one else accompanying her. Hadn’t she mentioned seeking someone’s assistance? Instead, she carried two tattered but clean-looking blankets, a handful of kitchen utensils, a roll of bandage, and most of a bottle of whiskey. She had donned an apron to cover her skirt and bodice, and the handle of the pistol poked out of a pocket.
“Where are your pa and ma? Did you tell them I’m here?” he asked, concerned that she had not brought anyone back with her to help attend to his wound.
Ella Ruth made a face. “They removed themselves to Charlottesville, but I refused to accompany them.”
“You did what?” He felt a fever rising as he spoke sharply to her.
“You must be quiet, Ben. Your face is looking very pale. I fear you have lost a great deal of blood.” She placed the items in her arms on the bench, then spread one blanket on the floor of the shed. She cocked her head to one side, then said, “No, I believe it is better if you lie on the work bench so you are high enough to tend to.” Moving the items to the floor, she retrieved the first blanket, shook it with a snap to free it of dirt and straw, and spread it upon the bench as best she could with him leaning over it. Breathing rapidly, she surveyed her work. “Ben, you must get atop the bench with my help alone. We do not have any male darkies about. The ungrateful wretches all ran off to the enemy when the Yankees started up the Valley this year.”
He groaned, half from disbelief that she persisted in her notion that she could tend him, and half from pain.
She glanced around the shed. “Oh, that stool will help,” she said, going to a corner of the building and bringing it back. “Darling Ben, I knew I must be here if you came through. How else could we marry? Besides, Uncle Joseph had need of me at the soldier’s hospital.” She put her arms around Ben’s chest and assisted him in mounting the stool and climbing onto the bench.
Ben’s head felt as though he had already drunk the whiskey, as a profound lightness was affecting his reasoning. He must be crazed to think about letting this girl do an operation on him. But what recourse did he have? She seemed to be the only person about the place, and mayhap her uncle’s skill ran in the family.
“Are you here alone, then?” he managed to ask. That would account for her fondness for keeping the pistol with her.
“No. One of the darkies, my maid Lula, stayed to care for me. She was rather mortified that I refused to go as a refugee with my parents, but I’m very glad she decided to stay with me. She is making you a bit of gruel.”
“You are a caution, girl,” he said, and that was all he could whisper as he lapsed into blackness.
~~~
When Ben awoke, his leg throbbed abominably, but he seemed not to have any fever. His stomach grated against his backbone, he was so hungry. Lying on the bench, covered by the second blanket, he felt vulnerable, and struggled to rise, but gave up the attempt because of the pain it caused.
He looked around. He was alone. His rifle and accoutrements lay heaped in a jumble by the wall. What was that cloth? As he was puzzling out the question, he recognized the patchwork handiwork on the fabric. Jerusalem crickets! His trousers!
He groaned. He did not recall having removed them. That could only mean Ella Ruth had done so. Embarrassment flooded his thoughts and his hands clutched at the blanket. He had quit wearing underclothes when the last pair to his name became holey enough to let the breezes through. Had Ella Ruth been so fully caught up in her self-appointed task that she had accidentally or willfully gazed upon his parts?
Her bold actions in the last few hours confirmed to him that her streak of doggedness, her obdurate, unyielding nature had not changed. Gaining her way was of great importance to her. Whatever he wanted could go hang.
But yet, she may have saved his life by her persistence. Removing a poisonous lead ball from a wound was of equal importance to modesty, wasn’t it? He chewed on that notion for a few moments. Would Ma be scandalized or practical about the matter? She had always appeared to have a direct conduit to God and His ideas of proper conduct. What advice would Ma give him, if he were to have the courage to ask for it?
The unseemly viewing had most likely taken place. He had an uncomfortable sense that this fell into the “offense to God” department. As soon as he could get around, even before he sought to rejoin his company, he would have to seek out a minister.
These circumstances accelerated the need for their wedding to take place as soon as may be. Otherwise, he could not make the matter right and assuage these overwhelmingly guilty feelings.
As he was musing on where he would get money to pay for a ceremony—which most likely cost more nowadays than the two dollars Rulon had paid over—Ella Ruth came through the shed door, bearing a bowl covered with a cloth.
“I’m sorry I don’t have a tray for your food,” she apologized. “The pewter was melted down ages ago for munitions, and Momma took the silver with her.”
Ben eyed the bowl. “No matter. I’m starving, girl.”
She came to the bench, propped him up, and handed him the food. “It is only corn gruel, but we do not have much in the way of provisions. Does your wound pain you?”
He paused between shoveled spoonsful. “Yes, a mite.”
“I have whiskey left over from cleaning out the injury. When you have finished eating, I will give you a portion to dull the pain.”
Ben wanted to finish eating before he got onto the tricky subject of clothing removal and its consequences. When he had scraped the dish clean, he handed it back to her. At least his stomach felt better for the food, if not for the nerves.
As she helped him lie back on the bench, he racked his brain for a suitable opening
to the topic. He couldn’t merely blurt out a question about how much of him she had seen. Perhaps he could approach in a sideways fashion.
“I’m obliged to you for tending my wound,” he began. “I reckon I need the limb for later.”
“Indeed,” she said, giving him a smile.
“As soon as it can bear weight, I must take myself back to the army.” No, that wasn’t right. The pain must have muddled his brain, and he’d completely gone astray from speaking of the obligation they had to marry.
He noticed that Ella Ruth had stopped smiling.
“Remember what I promised you? You were quite insistent about the matter.”
“Of course.” What, exactly, was she thinking about amongst all the things they had written about?
“You are here now. You are injured, which is unfortunate, but my hope is that you will recover, given time and rest.”
“I am agreed with that notion. I don’t want to be reported absent without leave, though. I’m not a deserter.”
“Then do not desert me.”
He thought about her words for a long time. How had this conversation gone off from his planned topic of discussion? The silence stretched on. It was his turn to speak, and Ella Ruth was clearly waiting for him to do so.
“I don’t intend to desert you.” He had to get back on track. He swallowed. “I do have a question.”
“Ask it, Ben.”
He cleared his throat. What a fix he was in. The words he needed didn’t appear as he had hoped. Where had his gift for fine words gone? All his charms had gone missing. Finally, he blurted out, “How much of me was uncovered and in your sight durin’ the wound-tending?”
Oh, shame! He’d gone and done what he had determined not to do. He covered his eyes with his wrist, then let the arm fall to his side.
“Darling Ben,” Ella Ruth said, after a very long time. “I caught sight of all of you.” She stopped, and he could see her throat moving in a swallow of her own. When she continued, her voice had acquired a huskiness that he found no less disturbing than her words. “My work with Uncle Richard obliged me to nurse men with injuries in every possible place. I suppose I have no reputation at all, anymore.” She inhaled deeply before she went on. “You may find me unattractive, now that you know I have seen other men’s most intimate parts.”
Certainly not. Even in her gaunt, war-worn state and well-laundered attire, she was lovely as could be. A yearning for her began to grow, but he squashed it in order to set matters back on an orderly course.
“I’ve compromised you, girl.”
“I just told you—”
“We must be wed, and soon.”
“I have washed those men.”
He shuddered. “For the honor of Virginia.”
“As I have you,” she said in a halting voice.
“No,” he moaned.
“Yes. There was blood everywhere.”
“We have to marry now. Today. Is Mr. Moore in the town?” He struggled to sit up, and his agitation gave him the strength to achieve that end.
“Ben, lie quiet.”
“You must send the woman for the minister.”
“He is gone, Ben. He was arrested by the Yankees for preaching against them.”
“The Dunker preacher?”
“Dead.”
“The German—”
“There is no one, Ben. We cannot have a church ceremony.”
“But you saw—”
“I do not care.” She lifted her chin a slight bit. “I have pledged myself to you, as you have to me. I promised to marry you, but we cannot have a regular ceremony. Let us make marriage vows to each other, Ben. That will put things right.”
“Ella.” He could hardly speak for the pain in his soul. “We must marry. Bring the judge.”
“He went for a soldier.”
“The mayor.”
“He is gone.”
“There is truly no one around?”
“Only the armies.”
He clutched at a straw. “Can an officer—”
“I do not know, Ben.” She shook her head. “General Early has gone south, and I will not be married by a Yankee.”
That prospect alarmed him. He could be captured and sent off to a prison. Exhausted, he let himself sink back onto the blanket. He had to make Ella Ruth his wife, but his options seemed to have run out.
Chapter 26
Ella Ruth — October 20, 1864
Ella Ruth leaned forward and laid her forehead on Ben’s chest. He put an arm over her shoulders. He is in such a weakened state. Does he know how much blood he lost? She thought not.
She turned her head slightly until she could see a part of his face. He was not looking at her, but at the roof above them. Such a puny roof. It leaked abominably, and she feared for his health if she kept him hidden here in the shed.
I need to move him to the house. He won’t last in this rain and cold.
How was she to manage that? Would Lula help her? Could she count on the woman’s loyalty if the Yankees came up the Valley again, or would the servant reveal Ben’s presence? Lula had been a trifle uppity the last time Ella Ruth spoke with her. Best not to take the chance.
She took a deep breath and expelled it slowly. How many more obstacles to keeping Ben safe did she have to overcome?
Her mind skipped to her main concern. How were they to marry?
All the answers she had given to Ben’s half-frantic questions were true. There was no religious or civil authority left to say any words over them, to sanction the union they had promised to make.
She felt a welling sadness rise from her middle. She wanted what Mary Owen had. The husband, even though he be horribly wounded. The child. The name. She no longer cared about the external appearances, the magnificent clothing and pomp of a church ceremony. She only wanted this man, her Ben, to hold her close, to caress her, to make her his woman.
What did words matter? They could say words, whisper to each other vows of fealty and devotion. She would promise whatever he wanted, if he would give her his name and his child.
A thought came to her mind, an image from her early childhood. The darkies had held a celebration she did not understood at the time. Now the meaning came clear to her, vivid in its import. Denied a Christian marriage ceremony, the slaves had devised their own.
“We will jump the broomstick,” she murmured against Ben’s shirt.
He lifted his head. “That’s the Negro way.”
“It’s the only way,” she whispered. “The only way left to us.”
She saw that he would shake his head, and stopped him with a brief kiss on his cheek. “We can have a minister when this awful war ends,” she whispered. “In the meantime, I will become your wife in the same way our servants have done.”
“Ella—”
She cut him off. “Poppa always looked on such unions as legal. He considered the couple married. He wouldn’t sell off one or the other and put them apart.”
Ben rested his head on the bench, stared at the roof again. “We must do right.”
“This will be right for us,” she answered. “You want to marry me. I want you... to marry me,” she added in a husky voice. “This is our solution.”
“The minute Mr. Moore comes back—”
“We will have words said in the regular way,” she promised, kissing his cheek again to seal the bargain.
~~~
Ben — October 21, 1864
The next day at noon, Ella Ruth brought Ben a plate heaped with applesauce, what could be mashed potatoes or maybe turnips, and one little piece of meat of an indeterminate origin.
“Did you eat today?” he asked her.
She tilted her head and smiled, shrugging one shoulder in a coquettish manner.
“Well then, we will share,” he said, and cut into the meat substance to divide it.
She tried to refuse, but he stared her down until she opened her mouth and accepted a bite from his fork.
“You really
are a caution, Benjamin,” she said in the old voice full of lightness and charm. “You need the nourishment to overcome that terrible injury.”
He knew what she said was true, but seeing her face, so thin and drawn, tore at his sense of the right way to treat a lady, and his notion of who should go first in matters of polite society.
When he had consumed what he deemed was his fair share of the meal, he gave the leavings to Ella Ruth, and insisted that she finish the food.
She did so under protest, and then set the plate aside.
“I must change the dressing on your wound,” she said.
His heart pounded with anxiety. “I don’t reckon it’s been bleedin’ or nothin’ of the sort,” he said. “You don’t need to bother.”
“I know more than you about treating a variety of wounds, Ben.” It was her turn to stare him down, and she did it with relish. “I will mind your sensibilities, but the flesh must be inspected for infection.” She began to lift his blanket.
He cringed.
Noticing it, she said, “Benjamin! Your brother Rulon recently took a number of wounds from an exploding shell. He’s struggling to survive from the effects of putrefying flesh. You don’t want that sort of problem, do you?”
“Rulon’s hurt? Lordy, I must go to him!”
“You are much too weak for that. Besides, the Yankees are still in the area. I cannot get you to Mount Jackson.”
“Cannot, or will not?”
“I cannot. Truly. Please trust me, Ben. Have I not proven myself to you by now?” Tears started into her eyes, and she appeared to be on the verge of weeping.
“There now, don’t you go to cryin’, sweet girl. He made a hand sign of resignation. “Look at the wound all you want, but don’t take any notions of, of—” He stopped, unable to speak further.
Ella Ruth took a shuddering breath. “I will be circumspect, my love.”
She raised the blanket enough to get a good field of vision of the wound site, and proceeded to take off the bandage she had applied previously.
Ben looked down his body at her busy hands, noting that they did not stray into forbidden areas. Since that issue was settled, he thought about the news Ella Ruth had sprung on him. Rulon was fighting for his life. The notion brought a sweep of nausea upon him. His next younger brother was gone. He couldn’t bear to lose his big brother, too.