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She clenched the telegram in her fist, crumpling the paper. “It won’t be as simple as that,” she said. “If he was dying when this was sent, he’s probably dead by now. ”
He fidgeted. “You don’t know that for sure. ”
“It’d take weeks to make the trip. A month or more, I bet. You know as well as I do what the train lines are like these days. Everyone talks about transcontinental dirigible paths, but nobody’s making it happen. Maybe I could hop, skip, and jump it by air—but that’d take even longer than going by train. Forget it,” she said, stuffing the wad of paper into her apron pocket.
Paul Forks stepped out of the stairwell and shook his head, “Yes ma’am. I’ll forget it. And I’m sorry, it wasn’t my place to bother you. It’s only . . . ”
“It’s only what?”
“It’s only . . . when I took that hit on the field, and when they brought me here . . . I sent for my wife and my boy. Neither one of them came. All I got was a message that my boy had died of consumption six months after I went to war, and my wife went a few weeks behind him. ”
She said, “I . . . Paul. I’m real sorry. ”
He shifted uncomfortably in his clothes. “Anyway, that’s why I stayed on here. Nothing to go home to. But I don’t mean to pry. It just hurts like all get-?out when you think you’re meeting your Maker, and there’s no one there to send you off. ”
With his left hand, the whole one, he touched her shoulder in a friendly way. And he left her alone there, in the stairwell with the message she couldn’t stand to read again, and no idea how she was going to answer it.
Still pondering, she went back up to her bunk, and opened her cases to retrieve the stationery she’d taken from Captain Sally’s stash down in the hospital office. Not knowing what else to do, or what else to think about, she sat on the edge of the bed and started writing.
Mercy’s handwriting wasn’t any good, because she’d never been schooled long enough to make it smooth, but it was legible. And it said:
Dear Mrs. Henry,
My name is Vinita Lynch and I am a nurse at the Robertson Hospital in Richmond, Virginia. I am very sorry to tell you that your son, Gilbert Henry, died this afternoon of February 13, 1879. He was a good soldier and a nice man, and he made jokes while we tried to save him. He had been wounded bad but he died peaceful. I stayed with him until he was gone. He spoke fondly of you and his brother. His last thoughts were of home.
When she was finished, she sealed it up and set it on the nightstand beside her bed, to be mailed on Monday, when the post came.
Three
Mercy Lynch told Sally, “Thank you. For everything. ”
She’d already said the rest of her good-?byes, though they’d been few: to the other nurses, a couple of the doctors, and to Paul Forks, who’d worked beside her for six months and would have guessed why she was leaving, regardless.
No one had mentioned her departure to any of the patients. It was better not to, she’d decided. She’d seen other women leave before, going down the rows and receiving impassioned pleas, promises of future remembrance, and the occasional marriage proposal; and she wasn’t interested in any of it. She’d learned, by watching other employees come and go, that it was best to simply leave at the ordinary time, and fail to return.
If she made any declarations, she’d cause a scene.
If she merely went away, it would probably be days before any of the bedridden men noticed. They had their own problems and pains to distract them, and the absence of one nurse out of thirty meant little to most of them. Eventually someone would look up, scratch his head, and wonder, “What ever happened to Nurse Mercy?” and then Captain Sally would say, “She left. Last week. ” At which point, the invalid would shrug.
Mercy figured it was easier to ask forgiveness than permission. They’d forgive her for leaving. But they might not give her permission to go.
Sally was different, though, and she understood. She lowered her voice, even though they were in the woman’s office and there was no one lurking nearby. “I’m glad you’ve got your widow’s papers, and the scraps of Union pension. That’ll take you most of the way, I expect. Their money’s worth more than ours. ”
Mercy said, “Ma’am, if anyone sends for me here, you’ll give them the address in Waterford?”
“Of course I will. Did I forget anything? You’ve cleaned out your bunk upstairs . . . and you’ve tucked away the nursing papers, I hope? My recommendation letter will mark you as one of ours, and that’ll be good for the first legs of your trip, but there’s no telling what you’ll find out West. ”
She promised, “I’m going south, then up the river and west. I have a plan. ”
“You’d better. It’s a long trip, darling. I’ll worry for you, and pray. ”
Mercy hugged her. Then she made one last walk through the first-?floor ward, past the entry to the ballroom, out through the corridor that would take her through the kitchen, and into the backyard grounds . . . so that no one but the staff would see how she carried a suitcase and a large shoulder bag stitched with a distinctive red cross. The suitcase she was taking had come with her from Virginia; the other one had been the property of the hospital, so she was leaving it behind. But the shoulder bag was a gift from Captain Sally. In it, Mercy carried the basics of her profession, as well as her papers, her money, a few small books, letters, pencils, and other useful objects that made her feel prepared.
At the curb to the side of the Robertson house, she stood squeezing her luggage and wondering where to begin, and how. The entirety of her planning process amounted to little more than what she’d told Captain Sally.
But first things first: She went to the Western Union office.
The clerk at the counter took the envelope with her father’s message and read it, and while he perused the marks, Mercy said, “I need to send a message back. To . . . to Sheriff Wilkes, I guess. Wherever this telegram came from. I need to tell him that I’m coming. ”
