The Freedom Star Part 32

Henry groaned and clutched his b.l.o.o.d.y shoulder.

"A Yankee run you through with his bayonet."

Henry closed his eyes again, moaning softly.

"I'd best find you some doctoring." Isaac scanned the battlefield. Union soldiers were helping wounded comrades climb the rise through the break in the fence. "The Yankees must be fixing their wounded up yonder. I has to get you to their hospital." He stood, then looked down. "This is gonna hurt some."

Pulling Henry to his feet, Isaac shoved his shoulder into Henry's stomach and straightened. Henry groaned as Isaac lifted him from the ground, staggering under the limp weight. He struggled up the gra.s.sy rise, following Union soldiers who were carrying their own casualties. They crossed a wide creek and came to an encampment. Wounded soldiers, mostly Union, lay on the gra.s.s under the shade of large trees. Rows of tents stretched across a field. Gently, Isaac lowered Henry to the ground, propping him against a tree next to an old, bearded Yankee who helplessly clutched a stump where his arm used to be. "You set right there. I'll be back."

Henry opened his eyes, but didn't answer. His face reflected the pain of his wound and the agony of being jostled across a mile of farmland on Isaac's shoulder.

Isaac approached a cl.u.s.ter of tables outside a row of tents. Men in bloodied smocks gathered around each table, working over injured soldiers. Cries and whimpers accompanied the sounds of saws cutting through bone. A tall man in a top hat at the first table turned around with the mangled lower half of a man's leg in his hands. He tossed the useless limb onto a growing pile of discarded appendages. Isaac gagged and turned away.

A pretty young woman dressed in black, her hair covered by a simple white bonnet, hurried past with an armful of rags. Several rags fell to the ground in front of Isaac. He scooped them up. "Ma'am? Ma'am, you dropped these."

The girl stopped and turned. She gave Isaac a startled look. "Thee is a Negro."

Isaac brushed his hand across his jacket self-consciously. "Y-yes ma'am. I reckon I is." He remembered the rags. Bowing slightly, he held out the cloth. "You . . . you dropped these."

"Thank thee. Bandages are in short supply." She stared at Isaac. "Thee wears the garb of the rebellion. Is thee Confederate?"

Isaac shook his head. "Just a slave looking to find the road to the Promised Land, but first I has a friend what needs doctoring."

"Where is thy friend? Has he been tended to?"

"No ma'am. I just now brung him over. He got stuck with a bayonet-run him clean through."

"See that copse of trees?" She pointed to a gra.s.sy area in the shade of three large trees. "If thee will fetch thy friend, I shall look at him there."

"Thank you, ma'am." Isaac bowed, then raced back to find Henry.

"Henry, I has to take you over yonder. There's a white woman who talks funny, she says she's gonna mend you. Help me get you up." Henry didn't respond. Isaac tugged on Henry's jacket, pulling him to his feet, then scooped him up in his arms and carried him to the trees.

"Place thy companion over there." The young lady pointed to an open spot between two Yankees.

Isaac gently laid Henry on the ground and stepped aside. The girl knelt, unb.u.t.toned Henry's jacket, and lifted his blouse. "Thee said a bayonet? This wound appears severe. Has he lost much blood?"

Isaac nodded. "Bleeding most all night, I reckon."

"Hand me a bandage, there." She pointed to the bundle of rags.

Isaac gave her a bandage.

She dipped the rag in a bucket of water and cleaned Henry's wound. "Thy friend has been blessed." She tossed the bloodied rag aside and bound the wound.

"Ma'am?" Isaac knelt beside her, offering another bandage.

"The wound is high in his shoulder, above his vitals. With prayer and rest, he has a chance."

"Doctors be fixing him soon?"

"The doctors are much too busy operating on the gunshot wounds, they will not see him today. Be thankful thy friend was not shot." She nodded toward the operating tables. "Those who manage to survive the surgeons do so at the cost of a limb. Thy friend's wound is serious, but I pray it will not be mortal." She studied Isaac for a moment. "Thee appears to be wounded as well. Come."

She cleaned and bandaged Isaac's shoulder. "What shall I call thy friend?" Her freckled face peered intently behind wisps of blonde hair.

Isaac stammered, "H-Henry, Henry McConnell."

"And what is thee to be called?"

"Isaac, I's to be called Isaac." He placed his hand on his chest and nodded.

"Yes." she smiled. "Son of Abraham . . . and thy surname?"

"Ma'am?"

"What is thy last name?"

Isaac shook his head. "I . . . I ain't got one of them, least not that I knows. Folks just call me Isaac."

"Well, Isaac, you have a fine first name. That should do for any man. And you may call me Hannah, Hannah Bunting. Will thee be remaining with thy friend, I mean, with Henry?" She placed a hand on Henry's good shoulder.

"Reckon I'll stay *til he's on the mend, then I'll be off to Philadelphia. I has a woman waiting there." Isaac settled against a tree.

"And a most fortunate woman, I would suppose. What is she called?"

"They calls her Raleigh, *cause that's where she was born."

Hannah glanced at Henry. "And thy friend, I suppose he has a girl waiting somewhere too?" Her cheeks flushed.

"Henry? He don't have no woman, not since the war. Used to be, he liked chasing them girls, but I reckon this here fighting is getting in his way."

Hannah pursed her lips, then quickly looked away. "I have never met a slave before. Thee must tell me of all the horrors. Is it as Harriet Stowe has written?"

"Don't know about no Harriet Stowe, nor nothing she been writing, but it's just living, same as anything else, *cept somebody's all the time telling you what for and cracking the whip if'n you doesn't do right."

"Sounds absolutely inhumane." she gazed at Henry. "Does he own thee?"

"Me and Henry, we growed up together. I expect now that Ma.s.sa McConnell, that's Henry's pa, now that he's laid up with his apoplexy, must be Henry is my ma.s.sa." Isaac took off his hat and fanned it in front of his face. "Don't matter none though, *cause I's heading north."

"And well thee should. *Tis an evil thing, one man believing he can own another. Thee must never go back where thee will again be placed in bondage."

"No ma'am, I ain't going back. I reckon I's done with slavery."

"Good." She stood and brushed the gra.s.s from her dress. "I must tend to the others. Will thee be here to watch over Henry?"

"Yes ma'am. I expect I'll be right here just resting up against this here tree."

Chapter Forty-three.

September 1862 "Where am I?" Henry opened his eyes, blinking at the waning daylight. Pain coursed through his chest.

"Hush," Isaac said. "You been hurt real bad. Lie still." He adjusted a frayed blanket around Henry's shoulders.

"Are we in Virginia?"

"Maryland," Isaac said. "You's in a Yankee hospital. Miss Hannah, she been taking good care of you."

"Who?"

"Miss Hannah," Isaac said. "A Yankee woman what tends to the wounded."

"How . . . how long have I been here?"

Isaac gazed skyward. "Going on four days. You took a bayonet in that shoulder. I brung you over here to get you mended."

Henry tried to raise up on one elbow. Pain drove him back down. "Yankees? You brought me to a Yankee hospital?"

Isaac plucked a stalk of gra.s.s and shoved it between his teeth. "All your Johnny Rebs skedaddled across the Potomac. This here is the only doctoring you's gonna get."

"How is thy patient, Isaac?" A young woman in plain garb nodded to Isaac as she approached, then turned to Henry and smiled. "Good evening, Henry. *Tis nice to finally meet thee." Even in the fading light her deep blue eyes sparkled.

"I . . . I . . ." Henry shot Isaac a quick glance.

Isaac gestured toward the woman. "Ma.s.sa Henry, this here be Miss Hannah Bunting."

"We have neither porridge nor meat," she said. "Fill up as best thee can on this hardtack." She handed each a hard, thick cracker. "The Union soldiers fare only slightly better. I will try to find something more tomorrow."

"Isaac says you've been tending to me," Henry whispered in a raspy voice. "Thank you."

"'Tis the kindness one of G.o.d's children offers another," she replied. "I should expect no less of thee, were the circ.u.mstances reversed."

"Meaning no disrespect, ma'am," Henry said. "But you's speaking in a curious tongue. Are . . . are you American?"

She smiled. "Pennsylvanian. Germantown Monthly Meeting, Society of Friends. Perhaps thee has heard of our work in the abolition movement?"

Henry scowled. "Quaker?"

"Yes. I came here with the Sanitary Commission to help relieve the suffering of all victims of this terrible war, blue or gray-even slave owners." She c.o.c.ked her head to one side and smiled.

Henry laid back on the blanket, clutching at the sharp pain in his chest. Even slave owners? She was a testy one . . .

"Here's another over here." Two Union soldiers approached the copse of trees. One pointed at Henry.

"What is thy need, sir?" Hannah looked at the taller soldier.

"Begging your pardon, ma'am." The taller soldier touched the brim of his cap. "The provost marshal ordered us to gather up all these here rebels and take em' yonder where they can be guarded."

"Can't thee see this man is injured?" Hannah stepped in front of the provost guards. "To move him now could prove fatal."

"Sorry ma'am, orders is orders."

"And what then? Will thee see to it he gets proper medical attention?" She placed her hands on her hips.

"I don't rightly know, ma'am. They ain't promising our own boys will get looked at. I can't say what this here Reb can expect. Reckon they'll give him a bandage before they send him off to Fort Delaware, but that ain't none of my concern."

"Fort Delaware? Does thee know the horrid stories that are told of that place?"

The soldiers looked at one another. The shorter of the two shrugged.

"Our monthly meeting has written a letter to President Lincoln demanding that he close that wicked prison at once. G.o.d frowns on such inhumanity."

"I expect he do, ma'am." The taller soldier pointed at Isaac. "Is this here n.i.g.g.e.r a rebel too?"

"Certainly not." Hannah gestured toward Isaac. "This poor man has spent a lifetime in bondage. Now, he has found sanctuary behind the Union lines. Finally, he is free."

The taller soldier glanced at his companion and smiled. "Good. Then he's free to pick up this here rebel and haul him yonder with the rest of them prisoners, lessen you'd rather we just drag him over."

"He has a severe wound. Will thee allow me to visit him and tend to his needs?"

"Shouldn't be no problem, ma'am. There's a pa.s.sel of Johnny Rebs over yonder. You can tend to them all."

She turned to Isaac. "Does thee mind?"

Pain shot through Henry's shoulder as Isaac carried him to the plowed field filled with wounded men in gray. No fences separated prisoners from the other wounded and what few guards were posted appeared disinterested in their duties. Isaac placed Henry on the blanket Hannah spread for him.

"Ain't no difference, here or where we was," Isaac said as he gazed toward the evening sky. "Either way, you's wet when it rains and hot with the sun."

"I must take care of others before I turn in for the night." Hannah knelt beside Henry, checking his bandage. "Will thee be all right until morning?"

Henry opened one eye. "I reckon so, ma'am. You've done some fine doctoring. Thank you."

Hannah smiled as she stood. "Until tomorrow, then. Sleep in peace, Henry McConnell."

_____.

Campfires flickered across the vast battlefield. Isaac rose on one elbow. Beside him, Henry appeared to be sleeping comfortably. Miss Hannah had him on the mend. This was his time . . .

He rose quietly and wandered toward a group of Yankees seated on boxes around the nearest fire.

"You has coffee?" Isaac asked.