American Dreams Trilogy

by Michael Phillips

  Meanwhile, he had to get his plantation back to normal, which, without slaves, would be no easy task. It galled him all the more to realize that his neighbor had been right about that too. Slavery was over and he had to figure out a way to get crops in and make a profit with a paid workforce. Notwithstanding his previous visit to Greenwood, the last thing he was about to do was ask for Richmond Davidson’s help. He would let Oakbriar sink into bankruptcy first!

  Richmond Davidson’s thoughts were occupied with his neighbor as well. He sat in his study, the torn portion of map that Cherity had taken from the Brown house in his hand. The moment he had seen it, though he had never laid eyes on it in his life, he had known what it was, for he had heard about it from his father. It had not taken long for him to begin to piece together its full significance. He kept his thoughts to himself. But slowly they grew into a terrible weight upon his mind.

  There was only one way Denton could have come by it. He had not wanted to actually voice his suspicions. But as he reflected on it, the more the suspicion grew into certainty. It was a bitter way for a friendship between neighbors to end, he thought.

  What should he do? The torn paper held the key to the truth. Yet without the rest—and how many other similar portions had been torn off?—how could he know for certain what these markings and strange designs were trying to tell him?

  His thoughts strayed to the safe against the far wall, and he glanced toward it. In that very safe his father had placed this bit of paper. It had inexplicably disappeared and its fate had been an ongoing mystery… until Cherity had seen it in Denton Beaumont’s possession at the Brown house. In that safe now was also a sealed brown packet Seth had given him to safeguard for Cherity until some future time, which he did not specify. Even Cherity herself did not know of its existence. James had given it to Seth on his deathbed, for Seth to give to his daughter when he judged the time right.

  What secrets that safe held, thought Richmond. His father’s secrets, his brother’s secrets, and now James Waters’ secrets.

  Richmond drew in a deep sigh and closed his eyes. At such times as these, the Not my will prayer of relinquishment upon which he attempted to order his life’s path did not come to his lips in the specific words of his Lord and Master. Rather it was a silent prayer expressed by the inarticulate heavings of his spirit as it lifted and sank on the eternal tides of life.

  Though he had not voiced it to Carolyn, nor would he, he knew that he must prayerfully keep in the forefront of his mind that his older son was still right in the middle of the war. Bad things happened. News could come to them any day that Seth had been wounded or killed. War brought tragedy in its wake, and no family touched by this terrible conflict was immune. He must remain strong. He must be capable of affirming God’s love and goodness in grief no less than in joy. Nearly every one of the hundreds of blacks whom God had purposed to send their way during the last half dozen years had faced tragedy up close. He had faced it when they thought Thomas was dead. If more tragedy befell their family, he must demonstrate that the words of solace and comfort he gave others were more than mere words, but were life and truth and strength that could stand even in the face of death.

  He drew in a deep sigh. God help me, he breathed. Give me courage to be your man even in the darkest hour of human suffering—the loss of a child.

  Richmond sat several more minutes in silent inner contemplation.

  His thoughts turned toward Cherity. What was his duty toward her?

  Slowly Richmond rose, walked across the room to the safe, turned the dial to the right and left, opened it, pulled out the brown packet James had given to Seth, then returned to his desk and sat down again. He stared at the envelope, which obviously contained a few papers and some lumpy object that felt as though it might be wrapped in cloth.

  He began to open it when an inner impulse stopped him. His hand paused as the words sounded inaudibly in his mind, “Do not fear, only believe.”

  Confused, the prayer arose, “What are you saying, Lord… what fear?”

  Almost immediately came the reply: “Respect the charge given your son. Its revelation is his to make. Do not fear, only believe.”

  Richmond’s eyes fell again on the bit of torn paper on his desk beside the packet with what appeared the partial markings of a map. Perhaps it was time for the disclosure of the one, not the other.

  He rose, returned James Waters’ packet to his safe, then, careful to protect it, he placed the torn fragment in an envelope and left his study.

  If Richmond had been keeping his own deepest prayers from his wife, he needn’t have been concerned to shield her. Carolyn’s own thoughts were bent in the same direction. Though they had no reason to share Cherity’s fears with regard to the train accident, Cherity’s departure and Seth’s silence had begun to weigh heavily upon both elder Davidsons.

  Even as Richmond sat pondering and praying in his study, the quiet urging of God’s Spirit had drawn Carolyn to the garden, where, like him, she was thinking of Seth, wondering when she would again feel her mother’s arms around the manly shoulders of this son she loved so much. War is hard on everyone, but hardest of all on mothers.

  While her husband’s prayer as he thought with heavy heart of his son was the Lord’s Not my will, the prayerful expression of the ache in her own soul took the form of the Lord’s mother’s, Be it unto me according to your word. In truth, they were the same prayer—the prayer of self-abjuring submission into the great loving Father-will of the universe. It is a prayer prayed daily, with words and without them, in a million different ways by those whose motives have been self-circumcised to God’s purpose rather than their own. It is a prayer that acts as a shuttle between the threads of choice and circumstance to interweave their invisible tapestry of character in the deep invisible regions of the heart.

  Even as Mary prayed the magnificent prayer for which she would be known through all time, the life of Not my will sonship and savior-hood was already birthed within her. Prompted by the same life-originating Holy Spirit, Mary declared by different words the very prayer her son would one day pray in the garden of his own severest trial. Surely in her own submissive obedience, Mary’s lifetime countenance of Be it unto me was a visible example to the boy Jesus as he grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man, strengthening him unto the hour when the ultimate Not my will would be required of him.

  And as Carolyn walked alone on this day in the paths of the garden and arbor of Greenwood, Mary’s example was near and precious to her. Sometimes in life, mothers are called upon to lose sons. They have the opportunity to do so with tearful dignity, following the lonely path of heartache trod by the mother of God’s son. For Mary too lost a son. She was privileged to lose her son, who was unlike other sons. And though Carolyn felt no joy on this day as she prayed Be it unto me according to your word, she yet felt the warmth of the Father’s arms enclosing her in his love in this, the hour of her own lonely garden sojourn.

  Sixty

  The lady at the boardinghouse in Bend knew more about the accident than anyone Cherity had yet spoken with, and knew every place where they had taken those who had been hurt. She said there had been three railway cars that overturned, mostly full of civilian passengers which probably didn’t amount to more than fifty or sixty people and that half of them were back on their feet and gone within several days or a week. But then two battles nearby had produced several hundred casualties, and hearing about the makeshift quarters in the region that had been set up for the accident, wagons full of wounded soldiers had begun arriving in Bend and Jefferson’s Crossing, and kept coming and coming until beds and cots were full and men and women with any experience or supplies, or simply extra space, found themselves trying to care for them. A few army doctors and nurses and surgeons, from both sides, had come to do what they could, but the situation remained difficult and all the wards were desperately short-handed.

  Cherity left after breakfast with instructions how to find three
farmhouses and the school in Bend where wounded were being cared for. She packed her carpetbag and set off for the first. She found it without difficulty. Her knock was answered by a small girl of eight or nine.

  “Mama’s in with the sick men,” she said, then turned and went back inside, leaving the door open.

  Assuming she was meant to follow, Cherity did so. The girl led her to a huge room that must have once been a dining room for a large staff of plantation workers, but where now a dozen or fifteen men were laid out on cots, some on blankets on the floor. The smell as she walked in nearly caused Cherity to swoon—the stench of bodies and sickness and disinfectant and coffee and eggs all mixed sickeningly together. She stood and stared aghast.

  A woman was working her way among the men with a tray in her hand, apparently taking them breakfast. She glanced up and saw Cherity standing in the doorway.

  “I see you’re finally here,” she said. “They told us you’d be here last night. Well, no matter… you can get started helping with the breakfast. Missy,” she called to the girl, “show her to the kitchen. There’s a tray all set out on the table. You can bring it in and then start by feeding that man on the end there,” she said with a toss of her head. “He lost one of his arms and the other’s in a sling.”

  Cherity stood speechless. Before she had a chance even to think what to say, the little girl had taken her by the hand and led her to the kitchen. A minute later she had donned an apron and was on her way back into the makeshift ward with a second tray of lukewarm scrambled eggs and biscuits.

  The woman glanced up again without expression. “Missy,” she called, “take this tray back to the kitchen.”

  The girl reappeared. Her mother handed her the empty tray, took the tray from Cherity, then nodded toward the man she had mentioned before who lay to all appearances dead.

  “Here’s a plate,” she said, dishing out a few eggs and tossing a biscuit beside them. “You’ll have to help him sit up, then get what food into him you can. Not that it matters, he’s likely to die anyway, but… just see what you can do.”

  Bewildered and numbed by it all, Cherity took the plate from her hand and walked to the end of the row of wounded men, wincing as she approached the broken and bandaged man at the end. Slowly she stooped down beside him.

  “Would you… would you like something to eat?” she said in a trembling voice.

  The man’s eyes opened like two thin slits. He saw Cherity’s face and attempted to smile though his lips were cracked and parched.

  “Thank you, miss,” he whispered in the weakest voice Cherity thought she had ever heard. “Do you think you might get me some of that coffee? That’s about the best thing I’ve ever smelled in my life.”

  “I think I could,” said Cherity.

  She set the plate beside him, then stood and looked around. Thinking better of asking the grumpy woman whom she assumed was the woman of the house, she left the sickroom again and returned to the kitchen where she found a tin cup and a pot of coffee. She poured out a cup and returned.

  This time as she approached and stooped down beside him, the man’s eyes opened a little wider.

  Cherity reached behind his neck and shoulders and gently pulled him to a sitting position, glad for the bandages and blankets that covered his wounds, especially over the right side of his body. She could see well enough that his arm was missing. She did not think she could bear the sight of the bloody bandaged stump of its end which looked like it had been either amputated or shot off between his shoulder and elbow.

  She reached the cup to his lips and gently tilted it toward him. The coffee was not very hot, and after a few sips, as she continued to lift the cup, the man drank the entire contents down. Finally he closed his eyes with a sigh of satisfaction.

  “Thank you, miss,” he said. “That was as good as anything I’ve tasted since I left home.”

  Cherity set the cup aside. “Would you like some eggs and a biscuit?” she asked.

  “If you don’t mind feeding me,” he replied. “You can see I can’t do much for myself.”

  Again Cherity helped him to sit partway up and leaned a pillow behind him. Slowly and carefully she fed him from the plate in her hand.

  “I could sure use another cup of that coffee, miss,” he said after several mouthfuls.

  “I’ll go refill your cup,” smiled Cherity.

  She rose and returned to the kitchen. The woman glanced at her as she passed with the cup in her hands.

  “Get on with it,” she said. “We got too many here for you to spend all your time with one man. The others have got to be fed too, then we’ve got to change the bandages and get them all up and to the outhouse. So don’t take all day with that one there.”

  The rest of the morning passed like a blur. It was after noon before she had a chance to tell the woman that, whoever she had been expecting, it wasn’t her. Rather than expressing gratitude for her help, the lady was clearly annoyed as Cherity made preparations to move on to the next ward to continue her search in the town school.

  Cherity put on her coat and got her carpetbag, then thought again of the first man she had fed. She set down her bag and went back into the ward and again to the far end where he lay. He was awake and smiled faintly as she approached.

  “I’m leaving now,” she said. “I just wanted to say good-bye. I will be praying that you will get better soon.”

  “Thank you, miss. That’s right kind of you.”

  He paused and a peculiar look came over his face.

  “You mind if I ask you something?” he said.

  “Of course not,” replied Cherity.

  “I got no arms left, least that’s what they tell me. Or… I think I’ve got one that doesn’t work and the doctor had to cut the other one off. But the funny thing is I can still feel them like they was both there. But when I want to move them, I just lay here and nothing happens. I know it’s taking a terrible liberty—I probably look a sight to a pretty young lady like you, and I know I smell pretty bad too. But the inside part of me’s just the same as it always was and that’s the real me, isn’t it, not this broken body that’s laying here.”

  “Yes, it certainly is,” nodded Cherity.

  “Like I said, I know it’s asking more than I got a right to, but would you give me a hug, miss? I want to feel a woman’s arms around me one more time in case I don’t pull through this.”

  “Do you have a wife?” asked Cherity.

  “Yes, ma’am. Her name’s Anne. She’s nearly as pretty as you.”

  “Do you and Anne have children?”

  “No, ma’am. We only been married three years. Most of that I’ve been gone on account of this war.”

  “Well then, I shall give you a hug for your Anne,” said Cherity.

  She leaned down, stretched her arms around the poor man’s shoulders and pulled him to her and embraced him tight for several long seconds. Then she relaxed and eased him back down onto his pillow. As she leaned away Cherity saw tears in his eyes.

  “Thank you, miss,” he said. “That was real nice. I almost felt like an angel was taking hold of me and was just going to carry me right away and up to heaven.”

  Struggling to keep back her own tears, Cherity left the house a few minutes later. She stood outside the door and took a deep, but shaky breath, then let it out slowly and walked in the direction where she had been told she would find the school.

  Cherity’s afternoon passed considerably less traumatically than had her morning. Within three hours she was ready to move on to the next town and walked back to the station. An hour later, after a ride of only about twenty minutes, she was the only passenger to step down onto the platform at Jefferson’s Crossing just as the sun was sinking behind the hills to the west. She looked about, her thoughts momentarily interrupted by the shriek of the whistle behind her as the great iron locomotive puffed its way out of the station.

  Grasping her slim carpetbag, she walked wearily across the wooden platform to the ticket
office. The long day was catching up with her and she was tired. She hardly noticed the grime and few splotches of dried blood on her dress. The last train gone, a lanky youth who hardly appeared much past his teens was just closing the window for the evening.

  “Excuse me,” said Cherity, “I’m looking for someone I think was injured in the train accident. Can you tell me where they’ve put them up in town?”

  The young man shifted a wad of tobacco from one cheek to the other.

  “Well, there’s a few here and a few there,” he said in a thick drawl. “Dick Garr’s been tending most of ’em, though he ain’t no doctor but he seems to know more about it than anybody else in town. Powerful lot of ’em dying, though, especially those they brung in from the battle just north of here.”

  “Where are they staying?” asked Cherity.

  “Like I said, here and there. Rev. Wilcott’s church has a lot of folks in it. Then there’s the Walton farm further on.”

  “Where is the church?” asked Cherity.

  “Yonder down the street,” he said, pointing behind him, “back of the dry goods store.”

  “And one more question, if you don’t mind… can you tell me if there’s a good boardinghouse in town?”

  “Don’t know if it’s any good, ma’am,” he replied. “I ain’t never had occasion to stay there. But Mrs. Butterfield advertises the finest of rooms for affordable prices. Course it’s also the only place in town. It’s just down the street yonder too, and then first street to your left.”

  Cherity left the station and followed his directions.

  Several hours later, she found herself turning over on a lumpy mattress for the dozenth time. The night was cold and she was wearing every piece of clothing out of her carpetbag under the one thin blanket, as well as the blanket she’d brought with her. This finest of rooms had a colony of mice living behind the wainscoting. A few hours after dark they had started up what sounded like a boisterous game of hide-and-seek. And now that what little moon there was had drifted behind thick clouds and turned her room almost totally black, their tiny clawed feet had taken to scampering across her floor. Somewhere outside a dog howled. Never had she felt so lonely in her life. The dog’s mournful wail reminded her of the wounded men she had seen throughout the day. She thought of the men out there lying on the ground trying to sleep in the cold—sometimes in the rain. What if Seth was lying in some such miserable sick ward? She could hardly bear the thought!