Harrigan's Bride. Cheryl Reavis
fingers were numb with cold. An abrupt gust of wind caused the smoke from what he optimistically called a fireplace to billow back into the cavernous room. He gave up all pretense of working, the full import of the predicament both he and Abiah were in making a jarring return. He had no patience left. He had to get this marriage done.
“La Broie!”
“Sir!” the sergeant answered almost immediately, his voice echoing in the outer hallway. Thomas suspected that La Broie’s staying so close at hand had less to do with efficiency and devotion and more to do with the fact that Major Gibbons had probably ordered him to do so—in case that wild Captain Harrigan went a-roving again.
“Have you heard anything yet?” Thomas asked when La Broie appeared in the doorway.
“Nothing, sir,” La Broie answered, giving no indication that Thomas had already asked him that same question a dozen times.
“Why is this taking so damn long?” Thomas said, more to himself than to La Broie.
“You know by now how the army works, Cap. It takes as long as it takes.”
Thomas gave La Broie a scathing look. He was not in the mood for any of the sergeant’s military truisms, sage though they may be. He was trying to take care of Abiah. She was ill, and gravely so. The doctors gave him absolutely no encouragement as to her chances for recovery from an illness they couldn’t even diagnose. Typhoid pneumonia, perhaps, they said. The problem was that Abiah had been examined well after the telltale “rose spot” stage indicative of the disease. She had a “continuous fever” to be sure, but no one would—or could—give it a name. The army hospitals were full of “continuous fevers,” which were fatal more times than not.
The best Thomas could do was to make sure Abiah had good nursing care, preferably by someone who understood the dangers of these fever-ridden illnesses. He felt an occasional twinge of guilt that the only person even remotely knowledgeable about these things also happened to be a camp follower. But, like everything else in this situation, he had had no choice but to bow to La Broie’s opinion of Gertie’s willingness and competency, and to hire the girl. So far Thomas hadn’t had cause to regret it—as far as he knew. Gertie seemed happy to have a paying job that didn’t involve throwing her petticoats over her head.
But he had precious little time left before Burnside began his redemptive push toward Richmond, and whatever time Abiah had, Thomas intended it to be as respectable and comfortable as it was in his power to make it. He knew exactly what had to be done, yet not one damn superior officer would tell him anything. How hard could it be to let him leave his quarters long enough to get married?
“La Broie!”
“Sir!”
“I want you to go see how Miss Abiah is this afternoon.”
“Sir—begging your pardon. Wouldn’t it be better for me to see Miss Abiah when I got something to tell her? If I go now and she’s awake, she’s going to ask me things I ain’t got the answers to. If I can’t say for sure you’re going to make it to the ceremony, it’ll just worry her. And she ought not to be worried, sir, I’m thinking. Besides that, she might have gone and changed her mind about marrying you. Maybe you don’t want to give her a chance to retreat before we even get on the field.”
Thomas had to agree, even if he was absolutely convinced now that La Broie had been given unofficial guard duty, and even at the risk of letting him have the last word yet another time. “You’ve got the chaplain ready?”
“Sir, I’ve got three chaplains ready. I’ve got a doctor ready if Gertie needs him—besides the one Miss Abiah’s already got. And I didn’t send off that telegram to your mother,” he added significantly, because, surprisingly, he didn’t approve of Thomas’s having changed his mind about notifying his family. “There ain’t nothing left to do but wait, sir, and that’s the sad truth of it.”
“You’re sure about the arrangements?” Thomas said, looking at the morning muster roll again and trying to get some idea of who was fit for duty—just in case he ever got out of this building and back to soldiering.
“Yes, sir. I’m sure. Zachariah Wilson has been well paid for the room and board—even if he wasn’t using the space nohow. He knows which lawyer will keep on paying him. So Gertie and Miss Abiah can stay right where they are while you and me and the army is gone on this here fool’s errand. Oh, and I been turning people down.”
“What people? For what?”
“People wanting to come to the wedding, sir. We got all manner of volunteers to stand witness for it—from both armies—plus a whole slew of bushwhackers and newspaper people and deserters. You know, it’s kind of hard to tell which is which when you get them all in a bunch. And then there’s some church folk from Falmouth and Fredericksburg trying to get invited. I’m thinking we might need a guard at the door. Miss Abiah ain’t well enough to have a bunch of nosy strangers gawking at her—and you—on account of she’s supposed to be ruined and not long for this world. I did tell all these hopeful guests they could send you and her a wedding present, though.”
Thomas looked up at that impertinence, but La Broie wasn’t in the least discomfited.
“Sir, I ain’t never been one to let opportunity stand around knocking on a shut door,” he said. “And while I’m at it, I reckon I need to be begging your pardon—”
The heavy outer door of the building slammed loudly interrupting whatever La Broie had been about to reveal.
“This is it, Cap,” he said instead. “That’s one of Sumner’s aides coming. The one with all them littlegirl curls.”
“Now how the hell do you know that?” Thomas said, trying to at least appear as if he wasn’t affected by the footsteps echoing briskly down the hall in their direction.
“It’s them prissy little silver spurs he wears. He’s the only one that jingles like that.”
It was indeed the aide-de-camp in question, an overly serious lieutenant, who knocked loudly and who snapped a salute when he was given leave to enter. Thomas was notoriously serious himself—but he chose to leave out the jingling and the posturing.
“Sir!” the aide barked, presenting Thomas with a folded piece of paper and causing La Broie to almost but not quite roll his eyes.
It was a pass, granting one Captain Thomas Harrigan a three-hour furlough in Falmouth. He read it over—twice—and then exhaled quietly in relief.
“No message from General Sumner?” he asked, without looking up.
“No, sir.”
“Then you are dismissed, Lieutenant.”
There was no jingling.
Thomas looked up. “Is there something else?”
“Yes, sir,” the aide said.
“Then what is it?”
“I’m not at liberty to say, sir.”
“Well, I’m not in the mood to guess, I can promise you that—”
The outside door banged loudly again, only this time it sounded as if an entire company were advancing up the hall—singing.
“Sir!” the aide barked. “It is my duty to announce that your groomsmen have arrived!”
* * *
Abiah noted two things when she asked to speak to Thomas alone. That he had gone to a great deal of trouble to look presentable and that he wasn’t entirely sober. She was familiar with the custom of fortifying the groom with whatever strong drink his friends could find prior to the actual ceremony. Hardly any of the weddings she’d ever attended in her whole life had seen the groom not tangle-footed. She just hadn’t considered that this particular wedding would precipitate the ritual and the boisterous male