Kary, Elizabeth (59 page)

Her
pregnancy had made that course inevitable. Though her swelling breasts and
thickening waist were only now becoming evident, Leigh welcomed the prospect of
returning home to await the birth of Hayes's child. There was a wondrous sense
of renewal in carrying life within her body, and whatever the future brought,
the baby would be her talisman against loneliness and fear.

That
there had been no word of Hayes worried Leigh, especially since he had not
answered the letter she had written early in July telling him she was pregnant.
Was he sick or wounded or merely untouched by her news? She had been sure that
once he received word of the child, he would set their differences aside and
write to her. But the days had turned to weeks, and no letter had arrived.

With
a sigh she turned from the familiar panorama before her to the road that led
back to town. Delia's departure from Vicksburg would coincide with her own,
since General Sherman's army had been ordered to Chattanooga and Mother
Bickerdyke and Delia were going with them. After the Union defeat at
Chickamauga, the Yankees had been driven back to Chattanooga and were now
besieged by the Confederates. In the city the Federal troops were slowly being
starved into submission, and if the Union Army was to survive, they must
reestablish their supply lines and go on to fight again. No matter what
happened far away in eastern Tennessee, Leigh knew there
was always a
pressing need for nurses. If it weren't for the baby she was carrying, she
would be going, too.

Moving
swiftly down the familiar road to town Leigh paused in the shadow of the
courthouse to buy a bouquet of late-summer roses before heading back to the
large, brick house she and Delia had occupied since the surrender. Since this
was to be their last evening together, Leigh wanted to make it special and she
knew how Delia loved to have fresh flowers on the table where they took their
meals.

Coming
into the entry hall, she stripped off her gloves and bonnet, then sought out a
vase and took a moment to arrange the fragrant, deep pink blossoms.

"Delia?"
Leigh called out when she was finished. "Delia?"

"Up
here, Leigh," a soft voice answered, drawing Leigh up the steeply curving staircase
to the second floor.

Pausing
in the doorway, Leigh laughed at her friend's efforts to wrestle her small
trunk toward the door. "Don't you know you shouldn't have more with you
than what you're prepared to carry?" she admonished.

The
diminutive blonde stood back with her arms akimbo. "This doesn't all
belong to me!" she defended herself good-naturedly. "Some of this is
Nathan's: at least two pairs of pants and a jacket, a few shirts and some
boots. The last time we moved, he was here to help me, not off 'consulting in
Washington.' Can you believe he just swung that trunk right up on his shoulder
as if it weighed nothing at all? I have been considering calling one of the men
from the yard, but it's really not so heavy, only very hard to handle."

Leigh
gave an exaggerated frown. "Well, if that's all it is, I think between the
two of us we can get it downstairs." Leigh bent to grab a handle, and
after a moment's hesitation Delia caught the one on the opposite side of the
trunk. Leigh was right. Between the two of them the trunk weighed hardly more
than Leigh's carpetbag. Together they shuffled toward the steps.

"Do
you want to go first, or shall I?" Leigh asked as they paused at the top.

"You
go first since you're taller. I won't have to bend over so much."

As
Delia said, the trunk was only cumbersome, and they made slow but steady
progress down the curving stairway.

"Watch
the wall," Leigh admonished as she guided her corner around the curve.

"Isn't
this why they put coffin niches in the stairwell, to get big boxes like this
down to the parlor?"

"This
isn't nearly as big as a coffin, Delia!" Leigh said giggling.

"It
certainly seems like it is to me!"

Leigh
turned to make another comment and in that split second caught her heel of one
of her slippers in the threadbare carpet. For an instant Leigh wavered,
fighting to regain her balance, but with both hands around the handle of the
trunk, there was no chance to steady herself.

"Leigh!"
Delia screamed as she saw what was happening, but hampered by the trunk, she
could not help.

As
if time were slowly reeling out before her, Leigh felt herself falling. She
twisted to catch at the stair rail, missed, and was helplessly tumbling again.
She rolled twice, watching the world spin around her as her skirts tangled around
her knees. Then she landed with stunning force in the center of the hall.

Delia
had managed to retain a hold on the trunk to keep it from following Leigh down,
but she had to struggle past it before she could reach where her friend lay.

"Leigh!"
Delia demanded, bending over her. "Leigh, can you hear me?"

The
concern in her friend's voice reached Leigh, though the words themselves did
not. There was a buzzing in her head that sent dizziness swelling through her,
and an ache centered deep inside ran weakness through her limbs. When Leigh
tried to rouse herself, the hurt grew stronger until it resolved itself into a
wrenching, twisting pain that tore through the center of her body. She writhed
helplessly in its grip, and Leigh was vaguely aware that Delia was calling
desperately for help.

Then
two male servants were bending over her, lifting her gently. But with the
movement Leigh's pain intensified, tearing at her vitals, and her tenuous hold
on consciousness wavered and slipped away.

She
never knew how long it was before she came to herself again, but after a time
the blur around her resolved itself into her own room, across the hall from
Delia's. One of the Army doctors was bending over her, and Delia stood at the
foot of the bed, her fragile features marked with concern.

"She's
going to lose that baby, and there's not a damn thing we can do about it,"
Leigh heard the doctor say. "She's a strong woman and will survive the
concussion and her other injuries, but there's no chance for that child, no
chance at all."

The
sense of his words reached Leigh slowly, and she moaned, as physical and
emotional pain mingled. "No," she whispered desperately. "Please
don't let my baby die."

Delia
was instantly beside her, catching Leigh's fingers in her tiny hand, stroking her
friend's brow. "Oh, Leigh, we've been trying, trying so hard to save the
baby, but there's nothing more to do."

"I
want that child for Hayes's sake," Leigh pleaded, weeping. "I want it
so he'll have reason to come home safely, so he'll have reason to love me
again." There was a feverish desperation in Leigh, a need to fight the
inevitable. There was so much more at stake than the future of her child.

"Hush,
Leigh, hush," her friend pleaded. "Hayes loves you, and it's too
late—"

"Delia,
please," Leigh murmured, tightening her grip on the other woman's fingers.
"Please, Delia, don't let this happen. I don't want to be alone
again."

"You
won't be alone; I promise you—"

"No,
Dee, please. If we try—" The pain came again, wrenching through her body,
and though Leigh fought to resist it, there was nothing she could do. It stole
her strength and dulled her senses; it decimated her energy and will. She
drifted away in a swirl of agony and despair as tears slid slowly down her
cheeks.

"Hush,
Leigh, hush. It's too late to save the baby," Delia crooned, not sure if
Leigh could even understand the
sense in what she was saying. "I'll stay here
with you until you're better. We'll face this together, Leigh, and in time
you'll mend. And when you're better, when Hayes is home again, there will be
other babies."

***

Chattanooga,
Tennessee

October 26, 1863

Dearest
Leigh,

The
siege here at Chattanooga continues, and food grows more and more scarce. The
mountains around the city have proved nearly impenetrable to our supply wagons,
and General Bragg is doing his best to starve us out. We have been existing on
half rations for weeks, ever since Wheeler's raids on our supply trains proved
so effective. More than three hundred wagons have been lost this month alone,
leaving us without the very basics of life. It is odd what hunger can do to a
man, everything from filling his dreams with groaning tables of roasts and
desserts to making him see fine horseflesh as dinner on the hoof.

It's
been damned cold too, and there aren't enough warm clothes or blankets. But we
engineers have cooked up a little surprise for the Rebels that just might open
a "cracker line" between here and the Union railhead at Bridgeport,
Alabama.

Hayes
could not say more to Leigh about the plan that was to be put into effect early
the next morning, but he was proud of his part in it. Under the command of
General "Baldy" Smith, the chief engineer of the Army of the
Cumberland, Hayes and his fellows had been preparing a pontoon bridge to set
into place nine miles down the Tennessee River at Brown's Ferry. If all went as
they hoped, a portion of General Hazen's brigade would float downstream with
the engineers to rendezvous with General Turchin's men, waiting on the eastern
bank. Once the pontoon boats reached their destination, Hazen and Turchin's
combined forces would fight to capture a bridgehead on the west side of the
river, while the engineers bound the boats together to form the substructure
for the bridge.

Normally,
building bridges was not a particularly difficult or hazardous operation for
engineering and pioneering corps as well trained as the ones with the Army of
the Cumberland. The thing that made this undertaking so dangerous was the
heavily fortified stretch of river the boats would have to navigate to reach
their destination. That the pontoons would be moving with the current was a
blessing, but Lookout Mountain fairly bristled with artillery, and they would
have to pass directly under the Confederate guns to reach the ferry. The entire
operation was an extremely well-kept secret, for if they were discovered, the
flotilla might well be under fire from the moment they left Chattanooga.

Despite
the dangers, the attack on Brown's Ferry was a well-considered plan, though one
born of desperation. If it did not work, the possibility of the Union Army in
the city holding out against Bragg and Longstreet's combined forces dwindled a
little more. They had all begun this campaign with such high hopes for a speedy
conclusion, but the Federal defeat at Chickamauga and now the siege at
Chattanooga had again robbed the Northern forces of their momentum and a chance
for victory. General Grant's arrival several days before had done a great deal
for Union morale, but if the attack on Brown's Ferry was not successful, even his
presence could not guarantee the Army of the Cumberland a second chance.

Hayes
stared off to the southwest toward Lookout Mountain, where hundreds of
Confederate campfires burned like beacons through the darkness, and then to the
southeast, where hundreds more glowed bright on Missionary Ridge. Did the Union
troops have any chance of escaping from the vise Bragg and his army held them
in? Would the pontoon bridge open up a route of supply from the north before
everyone in Chattanooga starved?

To
Hayes's way of thinking, the long days laboring to turn the lumber from
dismantled buildings into the pontoon boats had been time well spent, and the
hours of toil had helped to take his mind off Leigh, as well. Though he had
continued to write her faithfully, her silence ate at some-
thing deep
inside him, and he could not help but wonder at her reasons for cutting him
off. What had he done to deserve such treatment? How could she remain aloof
when he had written time and time again how much he loved and missed her? It
was one thing to go into danger knowing that a woman who cared was waiting for
his return. But without any word from Leigh, without the reassurance he was
seeking, he felt lost and strangely vulnerable.

Sighing,
Hayes glanced down at the letter on his lap, wondering what more there was to
say to his wife. He had complained about the cold and short rations. The way
things stood between them, he could no longer write Leigh that he loved her,
not when nearly five months had passed without a word. After a moment's thought
he picked up the pen again and dipped it in the little traveling inkwell.

I
heard this afternoon that Mary Ann Bickerdyke and her nurses are expected to
arrive with Sherman's army. This is wonderful news for the wounded from the
battle at Chickamauga, since they have been desperately in need of care. But
for myself, I hope you are not with her. Though my fondest wish is to see you
once more, Chattanooga is a desperate place, and I hate to think of you
suffering the privations the army is enduring.

Since
we will be up long before daybreak tomorrow, I must end my letter now. I hope
this finds you well and that you will write as soon as you are able. I am
impatiently awaiting your answer.

Your
husband,

Hayes