Her Hesitant Heart

chapter Sixteen



Joe joined her at the footbridge, plucking Maddie from her arms. With another sob, the child wrapped her legs around him, her face in his shirt. He hadn’t bothered with his uniform jacket or overcoat. Susanna looked down. His shoes were off and he wore moccasins. He must have been relaxing in his quarters when the sentry burst in.

“Joe, she walked from Three Mile Ranch!” she said, hurrying to keep up.

“Good God.” He held the child close. “She has a guardian angel working overtime, this one.”

“Are we doing the right thing?” she whispered.

“The rightest thing anyone has ever done, my dear,” he assured her. “We’re about to cure the common heartache.”

“I want her, but I know she will be better off here,” she said simply.

“Then bless your heart, Susanna Hopkins,” he whispered. “You’re one in a million.”

While Joe soothed Maddie, Susanna knocked on the Rattigans’ door. In his shirtsleeves and socks—Susanna had never seen him so casual—Sergeant Rattigan opened the door almost immediately, Maeve at his shoulder, her eyes anxious.

The moment she saw Maddie, Maeve held out her arms. The child practically leaped into them, causing her to stagger backward until John Rattigan steadied them both. In a moment she was seated in her chair, rocking back and forth, crooning to the child.

“Thank God,” Susanna whispered, finding herself in the post surgeon’s grip now. As Maeve practiced her magic with Maddie, Susanna told the men everything she knew. “The sentry thinks she must have walked in the dark from Three Mile Ranch.” She reached out to Sergeant Rattigan and he grasped her hand like a lifeline. She took a deep breath. “Sergeant, she needs to be here with you and Maeve.”

Susanna never dreamed she would see a sergeant with tears in his eyes. “You thought right,” he told her. “We’ll keep Maddie.” He bowed his head over her hand, unable to continue.

She looked at Joe, who was having his own struggles. “What a congregation of watering pots,” she said. No need for them to know of her tears.

“I have to ride to Three Mile,” Joe said.

“I’ll come with you, sir,” Rattigan said.

“As much as I love the infantry, you’re not much of a horseman, Sergeant.”

“No, I’m not, sir, but I can stay in the saddle and you shouldn’t ride alone. Let me get my shoes. We’ll stop by the barracks and pick up a squad of other terrible horsemen.”

The men left in a few minutes. Susanna sank down on the sofa, her eyes filled with the sight of mother and daughter. She closed her eyes against her own pain of wanting to be with her son. Maybe Joe had spoken truly. As painful as it was for her, this did feel like the rightest thing anyone had ever done.

When she opened her eyes, surprised that she had slept, she heard Maddie and Maeve in the postage stamp of a spare room, moving boxes. She went to the doorway and watched them as Maeve made a pallet on the floor.

“We’ll have a cot for you tomorrow, my love,” Maeve said. She kissed Maddie’s untidy hair. “Or maybe we won’t worry about this now. Let’s just go to my room.”

Maddie nodded, her serious self again, possessed of years beyond her childhood. “I’d rather not sleep alone tonight.”

“Neither would I,” Maeve said softly.

Nor I, Susanna thought. She knelt by Maddie. “Sleep tight, dearest.”

Maeve followed her to the door. “You have done the kindest thing,” she whispered. “I know you must want to keep her yourself.”

Yes, a thousand times, Susanna thought. “I have a son. You needed a daughter.”

Susanna stood a long time on the footbridge, watching the flowing water, seeing in her mind Maeve and Maddie cuddled together in bed. When Sergeant Rattigan returned, if there was still time before reveille, he would likely join them. They would probably sleep three to a bed, tight as mussels in a basket, until Maddie was ready to sleep alone.

The ice was breaking up and she knew there were fish below, freed from their winter prison and eager for spring. She had heard taps earlier, so it must be ten o’clock now, because the sentries were calling their “All’s well” around the post. Her heart was troubled, but spring settled around her, anyway.

The front door was closed when she came home. She went inside to see Emily knitting. Susanna sat beside her cousin and told her what had happened.

“Maddie will have a good mother now,” Emily said.

She had a good mother before, Susanna thought. She knew Emily wouldn’t believe her, so she just nodded.

Emily resumed her knitting as Susanna hesitated a long moment, weighing the consequences of what she wanted to do. In an evening of deep breaths, she took another one.

“Emily, I’m going to Major Randolph’s quarters. He is the worst cook ever, and I’m going to make him some muffins and coffee. He’ll be famished when he returns.”

To her surprise, Emily continued knitting. “I rather think you should,” she said. “Don’t put any of those everlasting raisins in the muffins. I’ve been hoarding a handful of dried apricots. Let me get those. Just soak them a little while before you add them to the batter.” She went into the kitchen.

Susanna took the apricots and kissed her cheek.

“And for goodness’ sake, do try to return before reveille, and use the back door. You know how people like to spread rumors here. I, of course, will be as silent as the grave.”

“Cousin, you know what I’m doing isn’t right and proper,” Susanna said.

Emily thought a long moment before she spoke. “We’re grown women. Maybe life isn’t just black-and-white, is it?” She held out her hand for Susanna to grasp.

Susanna walked two doors down to the major’s quarters. She knew his door wouldn’t be locked. Funny how a house with only a man in it could feel so empty. The lamp in the parlor still burned, so she sat in his armchair, tired to her bones. To her amusement, she saw he had tacked up the French words for chair, table, bookcase, books and rug by their namesakes. She went into the kitchen, and re-acquainted herself with French for sink, cookstove and a variety of edibles. She laughed out loud to see the word merde scrawled on the wooden box containing raisins. Good thing Emily had given her apricots.

The rest of his quarters were wreathed in shadow, but enough moonlight showed her an orderly bedroom, where the dining room should have been. She shook her head over the strips from an army blanket tacked over the windows, probably to ensure darkness for daytime naps after nighttime duty. She knew she was the only one in the house, but she still tiptoed down the hall to peer into the clinic for dependents. There were other rooms upstairs, probably empty.

She went into the parlor again. No pictures, no paintings, only a calendar. The books were mainly medical texts, with some Dickens and Victor Hugo, battered and looking much like a veteran of the late war, when Les Misérables had been all the rage. Still, the armchair was comfortable. She curled up in the big chair, her legs tucked under her, and fell asleep.

When she woke, dawn had not yet come. She hurried to build up a fire in the cookstove, which would have received a failing grade in her own kitchen back in Carlisle. At least he had the basic army food: dubious sowbelly, but enough flour and sugar to make muffins with Emily’s apricots. By the time Susanna found the baking powder, the small oven was hot enough. She knew better than to look for a muffin tin. She let herself out the back door and found one in Emily’s kitchen.

While the muffins baked, Susanna brewed coffee, breathing in the soothing aroma. She located three cups, one with a drastic chip in it, which she threw away. She poured herself a cup, sipping and staring at a mysterious furry mound that might have been bread once. She wondered what on earth he ate.

The kitchen was filled with the aroma of cooling muffins and hot coffee when she heard the front door open. Suddenly shy, and doubting the wisdom of her good intentions, Susanna considered darting out the back door. “Tell me this isn’t a mirage,” spoken in the dark with a Virginia drawl, stiffened her spine.

“It’s not,” she said, coming out of the kitchen. “I thought you might want something besides horrid oatmeal.”

He was indistinct in the dark because she had doused the parlor lamp. She came closer, still hesitant, taking her time. Joe hadn’t moved from beside the door, although he had closed it. Maybe he thought he was in the wrong quarters.

“You know, the muffins in the kitchen won’t stay warm forever,” she suggested, hoping to jog him into action.

“I’m so tired, Suzie.”

That was all she needed to know. She unwound his muffler and unbuttoned his overcoat, helping him shrug out of it. She steered him toward the kitchen, where he sat down heavily.

“There isn’t any butter, but I did find some honey,” she said, putting four muffins before him and a cup of hot coffee, which he sniffed, then sipped cautiously. His smile was her reward.

The four muffins disappeared and were replaced with two more, and then one. He downed one cup of coffee and was starting on his second when Susanna decided he was patched together enough to talk.

“Well?”

He gazed at her now as though she registered in his tired brain. “I can’t tell you how nice it was to open my front door and take a whiff of someone cares.”

She smiled at that and sat down in the other chair, after removing the medical journals. She dribbled honey on her muffin, and he held out another for the same treatment.

“The … oh, let’s call them ladies … were frantic with worry, so I reassured them that Maddie was in a good place and wouldn’t be returning.” He picked up his cup and stared into its depths for a moment. “No one objected to that. I wouldn’t have cared if they had.”

“Claudine is dead?”

“Apparently it was a more peaceful death than usual from consumption. I think her heart just gave out, which always trumps staring at blood dripping off your chin.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

“Apology unnecessary, Dr. Randolph. I wish you could have told her Maddie went to a wonderful couple who will love her forever.”

He took her hand. “I did that anyway, sitting there beside her. I assured her that Maddie had a guardian angel or two. Fifi thought I was barmy. I told Jules Ecoffey he can bury Claudine here, if he is so inclined. I think he will do that. It’s better that Maddie knows where her mother is.”

Without another word, he pushed away the plate in front of him and pillowed his head on his arms, asleep in moments. Since he was asleep, she kissed the top of his head.

“You can’t be comfortable,” she murmured after a few minutes. She gently shook him awake and helped him to his feet.

He offered no objection when she steered him to his bed in the dining room and helped him out of his uniform jacket. She removed his shoes as he sat with his eyes closed. His suspenders came off next, but her nerve failed her then and she just gave him a push onto his back. He unbuttoned his own trousers, then turned on his side and extended his arm.

“Lie down a minute, Suzie,” he said, his words slurred. “There’s a coverlet somewhere.”

She found it and did as he said, cautiously resting her head on his arm. He pulled her close and sighed. He sounded so satisfied that tears came to her eyes.

“I’ve missed this,” he said quite clearly.

Susanna was content to lie beside him and enjoy his warmth. Reason told her that it was no different from the warmth Emily gave off, since they had been sharing her bed. His hand was firm against her stomach and the feeling was soothing, but with an edge she had not enjoyed in years.

When he was sound asleep, Susanna got up carefully and eased herself out of Joe’s slackened grasp, making sure he was covered. It was still dark, but she heard reveille. Joe stirred a little and muttered something, but slumbered on, to her relief. She knew Captain Hartsuff was back at the fort and available. Joe could sleep, if he would.

She went quietly out the back door again and into the Reeses’ quarters. No one stirred yet, so she tiptoed upstairs, avoiding the squeaking tread, and lay down on her cot. She felt unreasonably content, considering that nothing was resolved in her life, the fort was tense and waiting news from Powder River, and she had no idea how her son was faring. Before Susanna slept, she wondered if Maddie could share her guardian angel with a child in Pennsylvania, now that she had found a safe harbor.

Susanna didn’t expect to see Maddie in her classroom that morning, so took the opportunity to tell the other students her mother had died during the night. Little Eddie Hanrahan suggested they draw pictures for Maddie, so Susanna tossed out her lesson plans and they did just that. The commissary clerk dredged up a partly used ledger from 1864 and her students drew on the pages she tore out.

She hurried to the Rattigans’ quarters during mess call. Maeve and Maddie sat close together as they looked at the drawings.

“Please tell my friends I appreciate their sentiments,” Maddie said in that dignified way of hers.

“Major Randolph told me Claudine will be buried here tomorrow,” Maeve whispered when Maddie turned her attention back to the drawings. “We’ll go to that, and Maddie will be in school the day after.”

“The sporting ladies from Three Mile will probably be there, too,” Susanna warned.

“I expect they will be,” Maeve replied, unperturbed. “I guess we won’t be bothered by the ladies from Officers Row, will we?”

When school ended, Private Benedict ushered out his children and helped her with hers, telling Rooney O’Leary to wait for him this time. Puzzled, Susanna looked at him. He drew her aside.

“While you were having recitations, Major Randolph stopped in and asked me to escort Rooney today. The major needs you.”

“What … why?”

Private Benedict moved closer. “Admin has the butcher’s bill from Powder River. One of your boys’ fathers is on the list and the major wants you to go with him to the home. He said it was your choice, though.”

“I’ll go,” she said without hesitation, thinking of Joe’s dangerous nighttime ride to Three Mile, when he already knew Claudine was dead.

She was sitting in her portion of the commissary storehouse classroom when Joe came. Without a word, he sat beside her and took her hand, pressing it to his lips. He looked so tired, and she suspected he hadn’t slept much longer after she left.

“Tell me first—no bad news for Emily or Katie?”

“No, thank God. The captains are fine. Apparently General Crook even complimented James O’Leary on his coolness in battle.” His arm went around her then. “There are four dead and six wounded, but here’s the tough part—Colonel Reynolds withdrew and left two of the dead on the field. One of those was Corporal Hanrahan.”

Susanna leaned her head against Joe’s shoulder. “Eddie Hanrahan organized us to write little notes and draw pictures for Maddie.”

“At times like this, the army doesn’t pay me enough.”

They sat together in silence for a few minutes more, then Joe pulled her to her feet. “We have to do this now, before word gets there before we do.”

“I’m afraid.”

“No, you’re not, just hesitant. You’ll know precisely what to do when Mrs. Hanrahan opens her door and sees me standing there, Major Grim Reaper. I’m counting on you to make me look good.” He gave her a slight smile. “Did you ever meet a more selfish man?”

“Actually, yes,” she told him, which made Joe give her a squeeze.

It was unnerving to walk with the post surgeon down Suds Row, and see women look out of windows and follow their progress with terrified eyes. Some crossed themselves, others turned away. Joe walked calmly, his face serious. She wondered how many times he had done this death walk.

When they turned in at Hanrahan’s quarters, Susanna heard a wail inside before Joe even raised his hand to knock.

Joe was right, she decided later as she still sat in the Hanrahans’ parlor, holding Eddie on her lap. When Mrs. Hanrahan collapsed, Susanna’s arms just naturally opened for Eddie, and there was room for his little brother and sister, too. She held the children on her lap and cried with them as Joe revived Mrs. Hanrahan, and gave her the additional bad news that there would be no body to bury. Soon the room was full of other army wives, many of them Irish, keening. In a few minutes they had shut the door on the post surgeon, death’s messenger unwanted.

Susanna stayed where she was, humming to the bereft children now, then talking to Eddie about books, and summer coming. She told him about her son, Tommy, and climbing trees, anything to distract him from the sorrow all around. She knew she was not successful, but she tried anyway.

The stars were out when she finally left the Hanrahans’ quarters. Her back ached and she crossed the footbridge slowly. The river was free of ice now, and she thought she heard small birds. It would be April soon.

Emily was waiting for her with warmed-up dinner. “Major Randolph told me you’d be late,” she said. Her face grew more solemn and there was suddenly nothing frivolous about Emily Reese. “Dearest, why do I feel guilty because my darling survived?”

“I don’t understand, either, Emily,” she replied. “Bless you, do you go through this every time he rides out of the fort?”

“Every time. No one talks about this before marriage. Then, it’s all gilt buttons and swords.”

Susanna gave her a brief smile. “Men are such deceivers.”

Emily looked shyly at her cousin. “Major Randolph said he hoped you’d stop by his quarters.” She blushed. “He told me thanks for the dried apricots.”

Susanna knocked on his door, then opened it when no one answered. Joe Randolph sat in his armchair, staring at nothing. His eyes flickered to hers. Without a word, he held out his arms and she sat on his lap with no hesitation. His heartbeat was regular and reassuring; she closed her eyes.

“You realize that when Louis Pasteur accepts you as an intern—I’m promoting you beyond mere student—you won’t have to make a death walk ever again. Emily told me the other deaths were single men, and the company commanders will write those family letters. No more death walk today.”

He was a long time speaking. “The death walk isn’t over, Suzie. Take a deep breath.”

She gasped and leaped off his lap, backing away and staring at him. “Please, no. Not Tommy!”

Joe hesitated, and she felt her legs suddenly give out as though some cosmic hand had swept away her knees. For the second time in her life, she fainted.

When she woke up, she was lying on the post surgeon’s bed, her shirtwaist unbuttoned and her corset stings loosened. Joe sat in a chair beside his bed, looking at her with an expression so tender she had to close her eyes.

“Please. You’re too far away.”

His shoes were already off. In another moment she was in his arms.

“Now you can tell me,” she whispered, her face turned into his chest.

“I’m not quite sure what to tell you, Suzie,” he began, “because there’s an unknown here. Take a deep breath. I mean it. Keep breathing regularly, because there is more here than I understand.”

The post surgeon took his own deep breath. “Along with the dispatch from Fort Fetterman, there were letters from Cheyenne. One came addressed to the commanding officer, but with your name under it. Colonel Bradley read it, then gave it to me.” Joe kissed her cheek. “Your former husband, in a drunken stupor, tipped over a lamp and set fire to your house.”

“Good God,” she whispered.

“Frederick Hopkins died in the blaze, according to your uncle. He wrote that there were bottles all over the house. Hopkins was a drunkard and dangerous, just as you tried to tell everyone at the trial. As for Tommy, there was no sign of him. None at all. He simply disappeared. I’m sure he’s alive, but no one knows where he is.”

She cried into his chest, partly from relief and partly from sorrow at Frederick’s wasted life. Joe’s hands were warm inside her shirtwaist now, loosening her corset strings more, and then just massaging her bare back.

“That’s all your uncle knows. The local constables searched and found nothing. If Tommy were dead, they would have found his body, the same as they found Frederick’s. They didn’t.”

“Where is he?” she asked when she could speak.

She knew Joe couldn’t answer that question. He pulled her even closer. “Tell me, is your son resourceful?”

She thought a moment. “I rather think he is,” she said. “After all, he and I lived for years in the same house with Frederick and his mercurial moods. Tommy knows how to lie low.” She burrowed her head into Joe’s chest. “But he’s barely twelve!”

“And resourceful,” he reminded her. “All I ask you to do is hang on a little longer. Al’s on duty tonight, and tomorrow we’re going to get a raft of frostbite cases from Fort Fetterman as the men return. You won’t see me for days. Stay with me tonight, Suzie. I’ll hang on with you.”