Blood Moon

by Jana Petken

  “Oh God, this is a disaster. I’m going to get into big trouble for this …”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Mercy drifted off in a fog of pain and exhaustion. She had left Dolly’s house around midnight, sneaking out the back door, warning the slave sleeping on a chair in the hallway next to the kitchen not to utter a sound. She yawned. She had no idea how long she had dozed on the boat’s floor. Not even the sound of oars gliding through the water had kept her from falling asleep.

  She came to and felt pain hit her senses. She watched Billy and Andrew row with smooth movements. If her wrist weren’t so bleedin’ sore, she’d offer to take over for a while, she thought. The boat’s movement was soothing. The sail had been run up. She thought this strange, for it would draw attention to the boat. “Why is the sail up, Billy?” she asked.

  “There’s a south wind. It’s pushin’ us along. The good Lord’s been kind to us. We ain’t got far to go now. See those lights ahead in the distance?”

  Mercy strained her eyes and then spotted a line of torches flickering in the distance. “Yes, I see them. Is that Fort Monroe?”

  “It sure is. When we get closer, we gonna holler for help, all of us. I don’t figure they’ll shoot without askin’ questions first. I hear tell there are slaves makin’ it into the fort just about every night. You just keep your body low and your head down – and take off your hat. It’ll help us if they see you’re a woman.”

  The first shots coming from the fort whistled passed them, just over their heads. Mercy and Mathew lay on the floor. Mercy felt her heartbeat quicken. So much for asking questions first, she thought. She had no gun, not tonight. She felt vulnerable without it, but she had been loathe to arm herself after what had happened to Lina.

  “Quit shootin’ at us! We’re friendly!” Billy shouted after the warning shots stopped. “We got a woman and a slave here. We’re loyal to Lincoln!”

  “Help!” Mercy shouted in a pitiful voice. She looked up and saw just how close the boat was to the fort’s walls. Blue-uniformed soldiers appeared out of the darkness, looking down on them from lookout posts. Their rifles were trained on the boat and occupants. If a nervous soldier pulled the trigger, one of them in the boat would be hit, no doubt about it.

  “We’re defectors from Norfolk,” Billy tried again. “We’re here to lend a hand!”

  “We ain’t got no guns!” Mathew cried out, following his brother’s lead.

  For a few moments, there was an exchange of words between the soldiers. The oars lay still, and the boat rocked gently in the water. They waited for a response. They were now at the mercy of Federal forces. Mercy stared at the guns trained on them. Her entire body tensed up, making the pain in her stomach more severe. She sat poker straight with her back against the boat’s stern. She had no idea what would happen next. She would end up either in a bed or in some dungeon – the bed sounding like the more inviting prospect.

  “State your business!” a soldier shouted down to them.

  Billy gestured to the others to keep quiet. He would do the talking. “We need your protection. We got two injured souls here. We’re out of Norfolk, runnin’ from the rebels. We don’t want no trouble. Me and my brother are here to join you fellas, if y’all will have us.”

  “Steer your boat real slow,” the same soldier shouted again. “Bring it to the dock. When you get there, I want to see your hands in the air – all of you. We’ve got our eyes on you!”

  The fortress was like an island, its stone walls sitting in the water like a giant ship. As the boat approached the docking port, Mercy’s heart sank. She would be imprisoned inside this bastion. She had seen their guard posts already and would observe their operations the moment they were allowed inside. Billy was right. If she wanted to, she could tell the Confederate Army about the Yankees strength in men and armaments.

  Jacob came to mind. Her information could help him and the soldiers he was with – maybe she would find a way to escape. She would run straight to him; after all, she knew where he was. He would be angry with her this time, she then thought. She could just imagine his disappointment upon hearing that she’d vanished again. Dolly would have no explanation for her disappearance, for she had not been privy to the secret Underground Railroad meetings.

  Jacob would suffer the agony of not knowing for certain where she was – she despised herself, for she had not kept her promise to remain in Norfolk, and the man she loved would now bear the brunt of her voracious need to free slaves yet again …

  Six soldiers in blue uniforms stood on the stone bridge looking down on the boat’s progress. Billy deftly manoeuvred the craft towards the dock and, after touching the wall, pulled the four oars into the vessel. Two soldiers waited at the top of six stone steps to secure and tie the boat off. Some of the soldiers on the bridge talked for a moment out of earshot, staring at her and the others.

  Only Billy and Andrew managed to raise their arms above their heads. Mercy and Mathew were unable to comply with the soldier’s order to put their hands up. Mercy prayed that they would not take this disobedience as a sign of defiance.

  The soldiers stopped talking to stare at Mercy with slack jaws as she slowly removed her hat. She said hurriedly, “I think my wrist is broken. I’m bleeding from a stomach injury, and Mathew here has been shot. Please help us.”

  “You just sit tight, ma’am,” she was told by a soldier with three stripes. “We’ll get you folks inside and patched up just as soon as we’re given the order.”

  After the arrival of an officer, things moved quickly. Two more soldiers appeared at an arched entrance which sat at the top of the docking steps. The boat party was told to disembark. Billy and Andrew helped Mercy and Mathew, struggling now with their injuries. The soldiers standing in front of the arch gestured with their rifles that they should pass. As they walked under the arch, Mercy saw that they were in a short tunnel; at the other end of it was a large courtyard.

  Once inside the fort, Mercy and Mathew were told to lie down on stretchers that had been brought for them. Billy and Andrew were led away. Mercy panicked, afraid of what might happen to them. One of the stretcher bearers reassured her and Mathew with an open and friendly tone of voice. “Don’t you worry none about them,” he said, smiling. “After they’ve been interrogated, they’ll get some chow and a bed somewhere. You just worry about yourselves. The doc’s waiting for you. He’ll take real good care of y’all.”

  Mercy felt her tense muscles relax into the stretcher’s canvas base. There was one soldier at the front end and another at the back, and they were being very careful not to drop her or rock her too much. This was another good sign, she thought. They might not be the vicious enemy that everyone in Norfolk was talking about.

  As the stretcher moved across what looked like a colossal piece of open ground, Mercy’s eyes scanned the area as far and wide as she could see. There were clearly defined outlines of roofs, buildings, walls, and passageways as large as streets leading to somewhere beyond this open area. The fortress was much bigger than she had imagined it to be. She could only hazard a guess at the number of soldiers occupying it at this moment, but she surmised that a great number would be needed to secure it from an attack by the Confederacy.

  Mercy closed her eyes, hoping to avoid a conversation with the stretcher bearers. Tiredness washed over her. She could quite easily fall asleep right now if she weren’t so filthy and sore. Her trousers were muddy and ripped by brambles. Her shirt was completely shredded at the front and stained red. Her hands were also covered in her own blood, and her wrist … Well, that was a fearsome sight.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Mercy looked up at the ceiling, then at the walls, and finally out of the window into the darkness beyond. She and Mathew had been separated upon entering the infirmary. She had no idea where he had been taken or what these people were going to do with her. She lay on top of a narrow bed in a room alone, waiting for someone to deliver news about her fate. The orderlies who had brought her
here had closed and locked the door, and for the first time in a long time, she allowed herself the pleasure of comforting tears.

  She recalled the sounds of dogs and screams, her running and stumbling. She shook her head from side to side in an attempt to clear these thoughts. She had failed miserably, and an innocent young woman had died. She shook her head again and squeezed her eyes shut. No, she reflected, she had not been negligent, nor had she failed in her duty. She had followed the same rules as always and had been more than happy with the route she had taken.

  She sighed loudly and looked at her wrist, lying limp on top of the covers. It was broken. Why else would it be twisted, swollen, deformed, and still excruciatingly painful? Her stomach had been left to air without treatment. It was a horrible sight. The gash was surrounded by dried blood. The skin around the wound had already turned black and blue, and her flat stomach looked like a lumpy old mattress. Her ripped breaches and shirt were still damp and smelled of river water, and even her muddy, soggy boots were still on her feet. Were they going to give her something for the pain, she wondered, or was she to lie here without treatment until morning?

  “Mercy, Mercy, open your eyes.” After losing the battle to stay awake, Mercy snapped her eyes open at the sound of her name. Her misty vision caught the candles that flooded the room and shadows, which danced on the walls from flickering flames. She cautiously turned her head on the pillow. Even the smallest of movements from the tip of her head to her toes caused her pain.

  Isaac stood at the side of the bed, smiling at her. The soft lighting and her exhausted mind were playing tricks on her, she thought. She closed her eyes and then opened them again. Isaac was still there, as large as life, beaming from ear to ear. “Isaac? Blimey, Isaac, what are you doing here? I thought I was dreaming.” She stared at his face. His boyish grin was infectious. She smiled back, yet tears rolled down her face. “Why are you here?” she mumbled through her loud sobs. She could think of no other thing to say. Fate had once again played its hand.

  “I’m serving my country, Mercy. I’m one of the fort’s surgeons. I’ve been here for months. More to the point, what are you doing here? Dear Lord, Mercy, if there is trouble around, you will surely find it. Are you never going to settle down and be safe?”

  Mercy smiled again at the pleasure of seeing him. She tried to sit up but couldn’t move. “I’m sorry – I can’t …”

  “Lie still. I’m going to tend to your injuries. No need to answer any questions for now. I heard all about your escapade from your friend, Mathew,” Isaac said affectionately. “You sure are a sight for sore eyes. I came as soon as I heard we had a comely Englishwoman with dark hair in our midst. I had a gut feeling it would be you. Only you could get into a fix like this.”

  “I know. I can’t seem to help myself,” she replied with another throaty sob. “Oh, Isaac, you can’t begin to imagine how happy I am to see you, but I didn’t want to come all the way here. I was supposed to leave the slaves and go home after they had gotten into the boat. It all went wrong. There were guns and dogs …”

  “Hush now, my dear. Don’t upset yourself. You may not want to be here, but now that you are, I’m going to fix you up and make you better. I prayed I would see you again – I only wish it weren’t under such testing circumstances.”

  Mercy nodded whilst staring at his blue uniform jacket with brass buttons and pips on the shoulders. “You look handsome in uniform. All I have seen these past couple of months are men dressed in grey.”

  Isaac caressed her cheek with his fingers. She blushed at his lengthy stare and earnest eyes.

  “Mercy,” he murmured, clearly embarrassed, “I need to treat your wrist first. It’s definitely broken, and I’m going to have to reset it. If I don’t, it will remain deformed and you will have trouble using your hand again.”

  “I understand.”

  “I’m going to give you something for the pain, but I have to realign the bones straight away. Please don’t hate me.”

  “Never,” Mercy told him.

  Isaac lifted her hand gently. Mercy stared into his downturned face. He was just as handsome and tender as her recollections of him, she thought. This was an unexpected surprise and not the ending that she had envisaged for this night.

  A sudden and intense pain shot up her arm and into her shoulder and neck. The bones in her wrist cracked loudly as they fell back into place. She cried out. Tears ran down her cheeks. There had been no ready, steady, go! Isaac had taken her by surprise. “Oh God, help me! That hurt!” she sobbed. “Please give me some medicine for the pain.”

  Isaac’s eyes told her that she was the last person in the world he wanted to harm. “Hush there. It’s over. I’m sorry, but in my experience, it’s better not to tell a patient exactly when I am going to cause excruciating pain.”

  Mercy half laughed and half cried. “Yes, I think I can see why,” she said.

  “Here, drink this,” he said, pouring laudanum into a spoon. “It will numb it a little and help you to get a good night’s rest. I need to splint your wrist and put on a heavy bandage. You won’t be able to use this hand for a few weeks. If you do, the bones won’t knit together properly. Mercy, can you tell me exactly how this injury occurred?”

  “I was caught by the wrist when I tried to jump into the boat – but the boat left the jetty at more speed that I thought it would. I didn’t jump out far enough and ended up in the water being dragged behind it.” She smiled at how ridiculous that sounded. “I think Andrew, the slave, tugged at it – but thank goodness he didn’t let go of me. If he had, I’d be at the bottom of the James River now instead of lying here talking to you.”

  Isaac shook his head again. “One of these days, someone is going to have to lock you up for your own safety. Darn it, Mercy, you scare me at times with your shenanigans. I would have thought what you and Nelson went through would have been enough to make you settle down.”

  “I’m sorry. Poor you – you’re always patching me up in one way or another.” Her eyes abruptly widened. Nelson? He’d said Nelson! “Isaac, where is he? Is Nelson here? Please tell me he’s here!”

  He nodded and offered her a big smile. “Yes, he’s here with me,” he eventually told her. “I will send him to you first thing in the morning. He’s a soldier, Mercy, and proud of being in uniform.”

  “A soldier? But he’s a free man. Was he forced into this?”

  “No, he volunteered with me. He’ll tell you himself that it was his own decision to join me here. No one forced him.”

  “I can’t believe he wanted to come back here,” Mercy insisted. “Oh, Isaac, we have so much to talk about – I want to know all about you in Boston and how you came to meet Nelson …”

  “You will, but not tonight. I don’t want you to worry about him. I’m taking care of him. I have since the day he walked into my hospital in Boston, asking for me. He brought me the wonderful news about you. Mercy, I thought you were dead – God forgive me, but I lost faith.”

  “I lost faith at times too. There were days I didn’t think we would survive to see morning. Nelson saved me.”

  “He tells me that you saved him.”

  Mercy smiled again. She was in terrible pain, but knowing that Nelson was well and here with Isaac was the most wonderful news, pain or no pain. “This really has turned out to be a very strange night. I missed you. Knowing that you took Nelson in means the world to me.” Mercy sighed and then began to sob. “God’s truth, Isaac, I’m going to cry again. I’ve become such a crybaby since you last saw me.”

  “Close your eyes, Mercy. Any man or woman would cry with the pain of a badly broken wrist and a torn belly. Let me tend to you. There will be plenty of time for us to catch up with all our news.”

  Mercy closed her eyes at his soothing words. She bit her lip to stop herself from crying out and attempted to concentrate on the news she had just received instead of the pain coursing through her. She thought about the Carrabelle and the long conversations she and Isaac
had enjoyed on the voyage across the Atlantic so long ago. Fresh tears escaped from her squeezed shut eyelids. Even Isaac’s gentle touch was agony. Nelson … She would think about Nelson, alive and well and in Isaac’s good hands.

  She wondered how she would answer Isaac’s questions when they came. If it became common knowledge that she was going to marry Jacob, a cavalry officer in the Confederate Army, the Federals might not let her leave the fort. Isaac would be duty-bound to report this piece of information to his commander. She didn’t want to lie to Isaac, but she was determined to leave here at some point and go to Jacob. She would get down on her knees in front of Jacob and swear on the nearest Bible that her Underground Railroad days were over – for good this time. She needed Jacob’s love, she realised, not more adventures.

  “How are you holding up?” Isaac asked.

  Mercy opened her eyes. “Better. Thank you.”

  “Good. I’m done with your wrist. I’m going to send a woman in to you. She’ll remove your clothes and clean that nasty wound on your stomach. I’ll be right back to put some stitches in it, and afterwards you’ll have a good long sleep.”

  “Thank you, Isaac.”

  When Isaac left, Mercy’s thoughts turned to Lina. If she were here, she’d tell her that the hand of fate had placed her right where she was meant to be. Her arrival at the fort, seeing Isaac, and hearing that Nelson was well and sleeping down the hall felt like a miracle rather than just an accumulation of coincidences. She thanked God for his intervention. She would no longer have to worry about Nelson’s whereabouts, nor would she continue to wonder if she would ever see Isaac again. Fate still travelled with her through life, just as Lina had predicted it would – and she was eternally grateful for its presence.

  Mercy was clean. She wore a crisp white nightshirt. Her stomach had needed five stitches, but the medicine Isaac had given her, coupled with a lack of sleep, had knocked her out. She barely remembered Isaac coming back into the room or putting the stitches in. She lay now in that luxurious state when one begins to drift off to sleep yet is still aware of surroundings and voices. The laudanum had dulled the pain somewhat. She heard Isaac’s muffled whispers to the woman who had cleaned her. Mercy listened to his lyrical tone whilst floating happily with the thought of seeing Nelson in the morning.