Field of Redemption Page 14

  Ian smiled at his choice of words. Abby was indeed an angel of mercy.

  “When Abby first came to Macon, I’ll be the first to admit I was suspicious of her myself. She being from Ohio and all.” Cora tilted her head and regarded Ian with an uncharacteristic tender smile. “I don’t think I’ve told you, Colonel about the night that all changed for me.”

  Ian shook his head. “No ma’am.”

  “Walter and I had an only child. A son so handsome it almost hurt to look at him.” She clasped her fingers on the table in front of her. “Harrison was thirteen years old, and had not begun to live the life he was destined for when he contracted typhoid fever. Within days it was apparent he would not recover.” Her voice trembled. “Abby refused to leave his side. She cared for him, prayed for him, even sang to him. When the time came, our dear boy was afraid to cross over, and Abby held his hand. She talked him through to glory, describing the wonders, and promising he was merely going ahead of the rest of us to pick out a prime spot beside the golden shores.”

  Ian had not known of Harrison Dobbs. Hearing of Abby’s compassion for the child only confirmed what he knew of her. She was extraordinary in every way.

  “When Harrison passed, Abby cried sincere tears right along with mine. I have accepted her into our fold from that day on.” Cora cleared her throat and straightened her back. “And I’ll not sit idly by while that drunken blowhard tries to drag her down to his level.”

  “Why do you suppose General Farris is so fixed on vengeance where Miss McFadden is concerned?” General Hawthorne asked.

  “I’ll tell you exactly why he’s so fixed on vengeance.”

  “Now, Cora, we really shouldn’t.” Walter patted his forehead with a handkerchief.

  “Abby sent him running out into the street with no pants and a shiny black eye.” Cora sat back and puckered her lips, taking in each of their reactions one at a time.

  Ian should have been stunned like the Generals were, but when it came to Abby nothing shocked him anymore. “Mind telling us how that came about?”

  “As we all know, General Farris has questionable business dealings here in Macon. Abby disrupted his income from those businesses, and he was determined to make her pay. Made a fool of himself if you ask me.” Cora’s lips thinned as she shook her head. “One day, he had gone to, shall we say, sample the goods.”

  “Cora, I insist you stop this instant. This is most unbecoming.” Walter warned.

  “Abby was there tending the rabble.” Cora went on. “Farris mistakenly approached her from behind in his red long johns thinking she was one of his business women. When she turned and saw what he was about, she grabbed a chamber pot off the table and gave him a good trouncing. Right in the eye. Chased him all the way down the stairs and out into the street. He was the laughing stock of Bibb County for months after.”

  “Cora, General Farris would not appreciate you airing his embarrassment.” Walter shook his thick muttonchops. “You need to stop provoking him, dearest. He has far-reaching ways of retaliation.”

  “Oh, Posh. He doesn’t scare me one whit. But I’ll tell you what’s unbecoming, Walter.” Cora was back to wagging her finger. “The way that man has gone above and beyond to seek vengeance on Abby. His hate runs deep. And I truly believe he’d stop at nothing to see her pay.”

  Stark dread gripped Ian as the truth of her words took hold.

  Farris would stop at nothing. Even so far as to see Abby hanged for a crime she didn’t commit.

  “Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me.”

  Psalm 141:9

  Sixteen

  Abby removed soiled dressings from the stump of an amputated leg. The young private laid sedated upon a cot. The forlorn way he stared at the wall undoubtedly had more to do with the healing he needed on the inside. Healing which would take much longer and require much greater finesse than she possessed.

  This soldier was more fortunate than most. No gangrene or infection. He’d most likely be back at camp within a couple of weeks. Carefully rewrapping with strips of bed sheets, Abby blessed whoever had donated the coveted cloth. They’d gone weeks without a supply shipment and now depended heavily on citizens to bring in what they could spare.

  “Can I get you anything, Private? Would you like to write a letter home?” Abby gently laid her hand on his arm, hoping to take his mind off of his plight.

  He shook his head without looking at her.

  In an odd way, she could almost imagine her mother going from bed to bed here, administering what medicine she could and always with gentle assurance. It would not have mattered to her what state or country these men hailed from. They were all God’s precious creations. She would have been determined to show them His kindness.

  A familiar wave of homesickness for a home that didn’t exist washed over her. They’d been gone for nearly twelve years, but little things brought back memories. Abby could almost smell the rosewater her mother wore on her wrists.

  “Abby, General Farris is here to see you.” An orderly passing through with a scrub bucket pointed with his mop down the long convalescence ward. “He’s waiting in the examination room.”

  “Thank you.” A rise of panic threatened to steal her breath. Encounters with Farris always ended badly. As a second desperate measure, she called back to the orderly. “Is there a Doctor on duty tonight?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Doc Lambert. But he’s gone down to the coroner’s building just now.”

  Abby refused the dread that seeped to her very core. Reminding herself that she’d done nothing to justify his wrath, she removed the bloodied apron, tossing it to a pile of laundry, and smoothed her skirt.

  Loud clanging echoed from the exam room disrupting the quiet aisles.

  Quickening her step, she was intent on reaching him before he woke every patient on both floors. By the time she reached the exam room, she would have run straight into him had he not stopped her with a bottle filled with liquor in his outstretched hand.

  The pungent swill sloshed over her bodice and she watched an amber stain spread across her sleeve.

  “I was beginning to think you weren’t coming, Miss McFadden.” His words were slightly slurred, and Abby immediately noticed he had a hard time focusing on anything besides the splotch soaking her chest.

  “What brings you to the hospital tonight, General?” She folded her arms to limit his view. “Have you run out of mercury salts?”

  Her hasty comment ignited his anger evidenced by the bizarre way his nostrils flared. He reminded her of a bull preparing to charge. Eager to dissuade the attack, she chided herself to hold her tongue. Goading him would only make matters worse.

  “If you’ve come to see Doc Lambert, I can go find him for you.” Abby eyed the door, anxious to be done with this erratic visit. Given Farris’ inebriated state, she was rapidly becoming more cautious.

  “My intent here regards you.” Farris tried to kick the door closed but instead his boot made contact with the wall, giving Abby time to get herself through the doorway.

  She immediately came up against the broad form of the general’s assistant who grabbed her arm to prevent escape.

  “No need to fear, Miss McFadden.” General Farris motioned for the soldier to escort Abby back to the exam room. “I’ve come to offer an olive branch as it were.”

  Nothing he could offer was of any interest to her. She’d already planned to speak with General Hawthorne about her travel papers just as soon as she got Hickory and his baby sister settled with a family.

  A sinister sneer crept up his face behind Farris’ ratty beard.

  The assistant shoved her into the room none too gently. What Abby wouldn’t give for a real olive branch just now to even the odds.

  General Farris lifted the bottle to his mouth and took an ample swallow. “As you know, I have recently taken a prestigious position overseeing one of the largest Prisoner of War camps in the entire western theater.” He stumbled but refused help from the beefy ser
geant.

  “Congratulations.” Abby murmured. Everyone knew it was a blatant demotion, one step away from sending him back to Alabama to do clerk work.

  “In my transition, I found in my possession a trinket that once belonged to a friend of yours, the unfortunate creature working the whorehouse downtown.”

  Though Abby tried to keep her expression closed, she flinched at the careless mention of Sallie. Was he even aware she’d died from the insidious infection he so freely spread? Truth be told, he simply didn’t care.

  Fumbling in his coat pocket, he produced a shiny gold chain with a coin pendant set in a gilded rope mount. “By my own generosity, I accepted this tainted bauble as payment for … a loan.”

  Probably the only thing of value that Sallie owned.

  “I hear the misfortunate Cyprian has mercifully passed on. Take it to her whelp.” A long draught from the bottle no doubt helped soothe his conscience –or lack thereof. “And now you may show your gratitude.”

  Apprehension swiftly gave way to outrage.

  Taking a firm hold on her courage, Abby shut the door herself, leaving the assistant to guard from the outside. What she wanted to say to the general was private and the patients need not be disturbed by any more of his drunk theatrics.

  “Sallie died delivering your child. From a disease acquired by you.” Abby snapped, leveling a heated gaze at the staggering bore. “Yes, I’ll accept this measly recompense for the baby on behalf of her mother. No generous gift from you, but an inheritance rightly deserved.” Sheer motivation to have this out once and for all, spurred her on. “And at Sallie’s request the child will be baptized in the Methodist church where her name will be recorded along with that of her mother’s only.”

  Unbalanced by a surge of fury, he tripped over his own boots, knocking a bed pan noisily to the floor. “If the wretched woman is dead, it’s only because you are no doctor. You have no business delivering Southern babies or even touching the most sullied of our confederates.”

  A pang of truth stayed her response.

  She’d done everything in her power to save Sallie, but the disease was too far advanced. With much manipulation and grace from above, the baby passed into the world without infection.

  With no warning, Farris gave a bellow and pitched the bottle to the floor in an echoing crash. Stampeding across the room, he pinned Abby against the brick wall. The bulk of his weight crushing her until she could scarcely take in a breath. “Do not provoke me, Yankee. I have tolerated your meddling for the last time.” Through clenched teeth his fermented breath blew hot and sour next to her neck.

  Struggling against his roving hands, Abby heard the material of her dress rip and felt the tender skin of her shoulder suddenly exposed.

  With a bruising grip Farris squeezed her arm as he spoke. “I now have all the proof I need to see your feet dangle at the end of the gallows. By morning, every good citizen of Macon will be calling for your execution.” His unbalanced heft shifted to allow her to jerk from his grasp and shove him backward.

  “You are insane. Release me this instant.” The catch in her throat belied her brave front. She had to get away from this madman.

  Just as he advanced on her once again, she reached for a syringe laying on a side table and stabbed it deep into the meat of his thigh.

  With a shriek, Farris grabbed at the needle, and Abby made a frantic dash for the door.

  It would take several minutes before the effects of the morphine dulled him enough to render him unconscious. She had to get far enough in that time that he wouldn’t be able to catch her.

  She prayed that combined with the half bottle of alcohol he’d consumed, she hadn’t just killed him.

  “Stop her!” Farris bellowed from the exam room.

  Soldiers in beds yelled for her to run. The orderlies hurried her along.

  With shaking limbs, Abby flew down the stairs, desperate to make it outside. If she could only find Ian.

  Choking back a cry, she was met at the bottom step by a barrage of soldiers, Farris’ assistant in the lead.

  At the top of the stairway, Farris’ voice screamed for her arrest.

  Trapped like a lost lamb, Abby’s world closed in around her.

  “You can’t reason with your heart; it has its own laws,

  and thumps about things which the intellect scorns.”

  ~ Mark Twain

  Seventeen

  Ian stood to leave, lifting his coat from the back of his chair.

  The meeting at City Hall had gone longer than he’d anticipated. It wasn’t until after Cora and the mayor made their exit that the meeting really got started.

  Against most predictions, the Federal General, William T. Sherman, had begun a southward trek from Atlanta with as many as sixty thousand troops. The confederate army had limited forces in place this far south with all roads and railways north of Macon disrupted by Union occupation.

  The cities of south and east Georgia had been put on emergency alert. Hopelessly outnumbered, the best they could hope for was to drive his line away from the cities and bring in as many defenseless farmers as would come.

  But for tonight, Ian would concentrate on clearing Abby’s name.

  Farris had not divulged just how she was supposed to be linked to the questionable break in. Simply having been raised in Ohio was not sufficient evidence to make a formal accusation.

  Ian hoped to catch Doc Lambert at Floyd House Hospital before he went back to camp. Hawthorne mentioned that Doc had examined the body of the soldier found behind the warehouses. Anything he’d observed, a bullet retrieved or any identifying articles, could provide crucial information as to this case and possibly even give a hint to the nature of Sherman’s advance.

  Above all, Ian ached to put his arms around Abby. To reassure her Farris’ ploy would not be allowed to go any further.

  A commotion erupted outside the room.

  “Colonel Saberton! What about the lady spy you were with earlier?” The muffled voice of the newspaper man called through the heavy door.

  Ian ground his teeth.

  The newspapers had been on a feeding the frenzy for sensationalized stories. All because the panicked public was starving for news declaring their army had the upper hand. He wouldn’t let Abby’s name be dragged through the mud just to sell a few newspapers.

  General Baker opened the door and the newspaper man burst into the room. “Miss McFadden has been charged with aiding the enemy. Colonel, do you have a comment about her arrest?”

  Ian froze as if ice water surged through his veins.

  He lifted a hand to stay the guards who held the man back. “What arrest?”

  As soon as they let him go, the reporter took up his notepad and began to scribble.

  Ian barely resisted the urge to knock the pencil to the floor and take the man up by his lapels. “I asked a question. Unless you’d like to be arrested for disrupting official business, I suggest you answer.”

  “Colonel Saberton is with our specialized forces, Mr. Greely.” Hawthorne intervened with concern drawing his gray brows together. “He and his men rarely need to repeat themselves.”

  Greely ceased his scrawling and looked from Ian to General Hawthorne. “Why do we have a regiment of Specialized Forces in Macon? Is there a whole espionage ring working out of Macon that we don’t know about? Was the colonel undercover this afternoon, trying to woo information from the nurse?”

  “I’m going to find out what this is about.” Ian slung his coat over one shoulder and threw on his hat, pushing past the man on his way out the door.

  “She was taken to Fort Oglethorpe—,” the reporter called after him.

  Farris had her.

  Ian picked up his pace down the long corridor of City Hall. One purpose filled every fiber of his being. Get to Abby before Farris made good on his threats.

  Unless Farris presented indisputable evidence, he had no grounds for holding her. More than likely, he was drunk, and trying to scare her.r />
  Thankfully, Abby didn’t scare easily.

  Crowded conditions and lack of basic necessities at Camp Oglethorpe bordered on inhumane. The facilities were not fit to house men, much less a lady.

  “Colonel, a word, please.” Hawthorne came up behind him.

  Ian couldn’t hide his consternation at being detained.

  Once Abby was behind the twelve-foot walls of the prison camp, it would be infinitely harder to gain her release. He needed to get to her before she was inside the fortress.

  “If you hope to see the girl, Colonel, you’d best hear me out.” General Hawthorne pushed open a door labeled, CEREMONIAL ROOM. “In here, we can speak in private.”

  The newspaper man lingered close behind, craning his neck as Ian shut the door.

  The general lit the tallest candle in a wide candelabra and then touched the flame to a cigar between his teeth. With a shake of his wrist, he extinguished the matchstick. “I have known Buford Farris for a very long time. He never was a good soldier. Always found reasons to sit on the sidelines.” He removed a fleck of tobacco from his tongue with a thumb. “Because of his fondness for alcohol, Farris took a spill from his horse early on. He was removed from the battle grounds to perform guard duty over Macon with very limited personnel. President Davis never thought we’d actually need to be guarded this far south, but here we are.”

  “All the more reason to get Abby released.” Unable to stand and do nothing, Ian moved to the window, looking out in the direction of the prison camp. “With a record like that, it shouldn’t be hard to have his false allegations overturned.”

  “He’s horrible soldier, true.” General Hawthorne shook his head and blew out a halo of smoke. “But Farris is a brilliant strategist. Don’t underestimate him.”

  Hawthorne, with his white head, hooked nose, and steely gaze reminded Ian of a great eagle he’d seen one winter by the Connecticut river. Astute and aware of his prey.

  The general tapped his cigar with one finger on a porcelain dish sitting on the polished library table. “Knowing there are no civilian laws concerning espionage, Farris has managed to eliminate Miss McFadden’s right to a trial by jury.”