Julia tried to ignore the letter on her dresser as she hurriedly pinned up her hair for work, but it nagged at her. It had arrived two days ago, and though she usually answered her mail promptly, she hadn’t answered this one yet. Her mother had written most of it, but she had attached pleading notes from Julia’s father, her sister, Rosalie, her aunt Eunice, and even Robert’s parents. All of them begged her to come home to Philadelphia for Christmas.
The truth was, Julia was desperately homesick when she wasn’t working at the hospital. She couldn’t bear the thought of spending Christmas alone in the bleak boardinghouse, eating stringy roast beef far away from her family. But she feared going home for two reasons. The first was that her father would probably never allow her to return toWashington. Julia knew that once she was home she would be drawn back to her old way of life as if wading into a powerful current, and she wouldn’t be able to—wouldn’t want to—escape its pull. Especially if Nathaniel Greene was still interested in courting her. At the same time, she felt guilty because the only reason she had wanted to become a nurse was to win a man’s heart—and now that she’d won it she was content to quit. Worse, Nathaniel thought her sacrifice had been selfless. He didn’t know her true motives.
The other reason she hesitated to leave was because of her patient, Phoebe Bigelow. Julia had brought her back from Sharpsburg to convalesce in Fairfield Hospital, and it still wasn’t clear if she would live or die. Besides struggling to recover from her wound, Phoebe was also gravely ill with blood poisoning and pneumonia, as were many of the other soldiers wounded in the battle.
Dr. McGrath had ordered a partition of curtains made around Phoebe’s bed, which had been placed in a corner of the downstairs ward beside the cabinet of medical supplies. She could still have her privacy, yet the doctor hoped it would cheer her to be with other people. Instead, Phoebe barely spoke to anyone. She seemed deeply depressed. The only person who could coax her to eat was Julia. What would happen to Phoebe if Julia went home to Philadelphia?
“I’ll answer you tonight,” Julia said aloud, patting the letter as if soothing a baby. She would see if Phoebe felt any better—and perhaps convince her to accept Mrs. Fowle’s care in her place.
Julia put on her coat and bonnet and hurried down the stairs, always with the same thought at this time of day—how long would she have to stand in the wind and cold this morning before finding a carriage? The winter had been an unusually cold one, and snow had already fallen. But when she opened the door, she saw Congressman Rhodes’ carriage waiting by the front walk.
“Good morning, Miss Hoffman,” he called. “May I offer you a ride?” The congressman stuck his head out of the carriage window, smiling broadly.
“You’re a lifesaver,” she said as she climbed in beside him. But she knew why he had come before he said a single word. “You are taking me to the hospital, aren’t you?” she asked.
“I’ll take you wherever you wish to go …but I sincerely hope you will let me take you home to Philadelphia at the end of the week. That’s when Mrs. Rhodes and I are leaving.”
“Let me guess—my parents wrote and asked you to convince me, didn’t they?”
“Dear girl, they have buried me in correspondence. I won’t be able to face the judge if I come home without you. So I decided I would accompany you to the hospital this morning and plead with your acting surgeon myself to grant you a leave for the holiday.”
“Thank you, but that isn’t necessary. I know he’ll grant me a leave if I ask for one.”
“Then I gather that you haven’t asked,” Rhodes said quietly.
“Not yet. We’ve been overwhelmed these past months coping with all the soldiers who were wounded at Antietam.”
“A dreadful waste,” Rhodes said with a sigh. “They’re estimating our final toll at more than twelve thousand casualties. Can you imagine that? Still, we drove the Rebels to their knees. Why on earth General McClellan didn’t follow up his victory and put an end to Lee is beyond me. Well, it’s beyond everyone! Let’s hope Ambrose Burnside will get the job done. He’s a rather ridiculous-looking fellow with all that absurd facial hair, but he’s a better general than McClellan was. At least Burnside has the army marching toward Richmond again. Hopefully this will be the last battle we’ll have to fight. I think the war will end very soon, before the year is over. Heaven knows I’m certainly tired of it.”
“How far are they from Richmond?” Julia asked, thinking of her cousin Caroline.
“They’re in Fredericksburg. It’s about halfway between Washington and Richmond. And it looks as though there might be a battle there shortly. The Confederates are marshalling their troops— but we have to cross the Rappahannock River first. The blasted Rebels burned all the bridges, of course. We’ll have to construct pontoon bridges. Nasty inconvenience.”
Julia allowed the congressman to ramble on about the war as they drove, grateful for the change of topic. But when they finally arrived at the hospital, he quickly returned to his reason for seeing her.
“My dear,” he said, taking her hands, “won’t you—” He stopped abruptly and looked down. “What have you been doing with these hands, Julia? My scrubwoman’s hands are softer than these.”
“I know.” She tried to free herself, but he wouldn’t let go. His eyes searched hers.
“If you’re doing penance for Bull Run, you’ve already atoned for—”
“It isn’t that,” she said quickly. “I enjoy my work, in spite of what my hands look like.”
“Promise me you’ll come home with us this Friday,” he begged. “I’ll purchase the tickets today.”
Julia didn’t see any way out of it. She was afraid he would come inside the hospital and make a scene if she refused. “All right,” she said. “I promise.” The moment she made the decision, Julia felt immediately relieved. She was going home.
“Oh, and Julia,” Rhodes added as she climbed from the carriage, “when you greet your parents, wear gloves.”
Julia hurried inside, nearly tripping over a pile of letters that the mailman had deposited inside the front door. She scooped them up and set them on Dr. McGrath’s desk while she hung up her coat and bonnet. His office was empty. Most of the letters were for the soldiers, and she took a moment to sort through them, separating the ones for the patients on second floor from the ones downstairs. In the middle of the pile, she found a letter for James.
The stationery was cream vellum. A feminine hand had written in dark ink, Dr. James J. McGrath. The return address read Mrs. James McGrath, Whitney Avenue, New Haven, Connecticut. Julia laid the letter on his desk.
She carried the rest of the mail into the downstairs ward and saw the doctor standing beside a patient’s bed. Just as she entered, James threw back his head and laughed, then rested his hand on the man’s shoulder for a moment.
“No, I hadn’t heard that one before, Hamilton. That’s a good one.” His laughter was a very rare sound. The only time she ever heard it was when he joked with his patients. She liked being with him then, making the rounds, working alongside him.
Julia carried the letters over to one of the volunteers. “Good morning, Mrs. Gardner. The morning mail just came. Would you please help me pass it out?”
“I’d be glad to.” Mrs. Gardner was one of several women at the hospital who had come toWashington after learning that their loved ones had been wounded. But like all the other mothers and wives and sisters, she helped tend to the needs of all the men, not just her own. Julia gave Mrs. Gardner half the letters to distribute and was about to take the rest upstairs when the doctor called her over. He was going to see Phoebe next.
“Were there any letters for Miss Bigelow?” he asked.
“No. I asked her several times if she wanted me to write to anyone for her, and she said there was no one to write to. She has three brothers in the army, but she doesn’t know where they are.”
“Find out their names. I’ll see what I can do.”
He motioned for Julia to follow him as he ducked behind the bed curtains. Phoebe had fallen asleep reading the small, badly wrinkled Bible Julia had found in her uniform pocket. She had offered to give her one in better condition, but Phoebe had refused. She read the book every day as if it were a letter from home.
The doctor bent over the bed and rested his hand on Phoebe’s forehead for a moment. Julia had seen him do it countless times with his other patients, and she was always struck by the tenderness of the gesture, as if he longed to impart healing through his touch. She liked this man very much and didn’t feel at all afraid of him. But every time he walked out of the ward and returned to his office he became that other, disagreeable man.
He listened with his stethoscope, then exhaled. “I want you to start giving her quinine. I think there may be more than one cause for her fever.”
“Yes, Doctor. Should I wake her now and give it to her?”
“Let her sleep.”
When he turned to his next patient, Julia hurried upstairs. The men were always overjoyed to receive mail—and she made sure to spend a few extra minutes with the ones who didn’t.
Julia daydreamed of home all morning as she worked, planning what she would wear on the journey and which Philadelphia stores she would shop in for Christmas presents. She couldn’t help thinking about Nathaniel, wondering if he would ask her to the Music Society’s Christmas Ball, dreaming of what it would be like to dance with him. She imagined herself in a new ball gown, whirling around the floor in his arms, gazing up into his handsome face. Maybe on the carriage ride home Nathaniel would lean close to her and steal a kiss and it would be as wonderful as she’d dreamed a kiss would be.
“You sure look happy today, Mrs. Hoffman,” one of her patients commented.
“Yes, Private Carter, I guess I am.”
At noon she went downstairs to make sure Phoebe ate some lunch. Julia found her propped up in bed, awkwardly eating a bowl of soup with her left hand. Doctor McGrath had immobilized her right arm in a sling while her shoulder healed.
“Are you doing okay, Phoebe?” she asked.
“Thought I’d save you the bother of fussing with me.”
“It’s no bother.” But at least Julia knew Phoebe wouldn’t starve if she went home to Philadelphia. And Phoebe seemed a little stronger today. When she finished the soup, Julia gave her some quinine and then coaxed her into talking about her brothers.
“Junior’s the oldest,” Phoebe began.
“Is that his real name or a nickname?”
“I guess he’s called Curtis, after Pa. The other two are named Willard and Jack.”
“Do you know where they went to enlist?”
“They said they was going to Cincinnati, but I don’t know for sure. Why are you asking about them?”
“Wouldn’t you like to write to them and find out how they’re doing?”
Phoebe’s face went rigid. “Junior will be mad when he finds out I left home.”
“Where is home, Phoebe?”
She slowly slid down in bed until she was lying on her side, then closed her eyes. “Ain’t none of your business.”
The encounter unsettled Julia. Phoebe obviously had her secrets—but then, so did she. All that afternoon, whenever Julia tried to imagine herself with Nathaniel Greene, she now felt a growing sense of unease. Should she allow him to go on thinking she was selfless and compassionate? Or should she tell him the truth about her true motivation and about the lies she’d told in order to become a nurse? By the end of the day, Julia still hadn’t decided.
But she had made up her mind to tell Dr. McGrath that she would be returning to Philadelphia at the end of the week. She went to his office in the front hallway to speak with him and met up with a uniformed army officer who was just leaving.
“Very good, James,” the man said, shaking the doctor’s hand. “I’ll see you in Fredericksburg.” He tipped his hat to Julia as he went out the door. “Ma’am…”
Dr. McGrath was needed in the field again. That meant they would also need nurses. Julia suddenly decided that she would go to Fredericksburg, too. The congressman had said it would be the last battle of the war. This would probably be the last chance she had to serve on the battlefield before returning to her former life in Philadelphia. She would go, not to impress anyone this time, but out of compassion. She would serve God one last time.
Her mind made up, Julia walked into Dr. McGrath’s office. “I’m going to Fredericksburg, too,” she told him.
“Why should I care what you do?” He sat behind his desk, shuffling through papers. He didn’t look up. “I know better than to try and stop you,” he added.
“The Sanitary Commission always needs volunteers,” she said. “They’ll be happy to have me. But I thought since we’re used to working with each other that I would save you the trouble of training a new nurse. I know you have your own way of doing things. And you know how well we work together.”
He sighed and leaned back in his chair. “I don’t suppose you would like to tell me why you’re going?”
“For the same reasons that you are. I want to help.”
He leaned forward again, studying her carefully. “And you aren’t afraid?” he asked quietly.
Julia didn’t know which he meant—was she afraid of the battle or of him?
“No,” she said. But she was a little afraid …of both.
He pulled out his pocket watch and looked at it. “You don’t have much time to pack, Mrs. Hoffman. The ship I’m taking to Aquia Landing leaves Alexandria tomorrow morning at five o’clock.”
“I’ll be there,” she said.
Fredericksburg, Virginia
December 1862
Julia and James were among the dozens of doctors and nurses who boarded the Mary Jane the next morning to sail forty miles down the Potomac to Aquia Landing. From there it was a much shorter trip by train to Falmouth on the north bank of the Rappahannock. Across the river lay the city of Fredericksburg. Julia saw the city in the fading light that first evening, a sleepy cluster of houses and brick buildings with graceful church steeples pointing to the sky. Stone piers on each bank of the river and one in its center marked the place where a railroad bridge had once stood. Before dawn, Julia was told, army engineers would begin constructing pontoon bridges across the water so the assault could begin.
Julia and the other nurses spent a cold night sleeping on empty pews in one of Falmouth’s churches. Tomorrow it would become a hospital. She had spent several hours that evening helping James arrange everything the way he wanted it.
The distant boom of a cannon awakened her the next morning. As the sun burned away the mist that hovered over the river, she could see the partially completed pontoon bridges. She also saw puffs of smoke from the Confederate side and heard the crack of rifles as Rebel sharpshooters opened fire on the laborers and engineers. Wounded bridge workers began arriving at the field hospital a short time later. Julia’s job had begun.
She assisted James with wound dressings until early afternoon, when the army decided that too many of their workmen were being injured. They halted construction and brought in one hundred artillery pieces, aiming them at Fredericksburg. Bombarding the city would annihilate Rebel resistance so that the bridges could be completed safely.
The horrific cannon fire lasted for two hours. Even with cotton stuffed in her ears, Julia thought she would go deaf from the noise. She sat on one of the church pews and prayed for the town’s citizens— especially the innocent women and children who might be trapped in the holocaust. Long after the violence ended, Julia’s knees continued to shake.
When the smoke cleared, the town stood in ruins. Julia didn’t see how anyone could have survived such an onslaught. But as soon as the engineers resumed work on the bridges, the Rebel sharpshooters quickly put the hospital back in business.
“All we did was give the Confederates some nice piles of rubble to hide behind,” she heard James say as he bent to examine one of the newest shooting victims.
“We wasted our cannonballs for nothing,” the soldier breathed.
“We wasted an entire town for nothing,” James said.
More wounded men poured into the hospital after the army finally sent squadrons of soldiers across the river in pontoon boats to clear the Rebels out. The skirmishing and the incoming casualties lasted all afternoon. By nightfall the bridges were complete, and most of the men who had been wounded that day were on their way to the evacuation ships. The doctors needed to make room in the hospitals for more casualties tomorrow.
Her work finished for the day, Julia put on her coat and went outside to stand in the smoke-filled air, gazing at the destruction across the river. Flames from the still-burning town lit the night sky, interspersed with bright flashes of Confederate artillery hidden in the hills above it. It was a nightmarish scene, yet she couldn’t look away.
A few minutes later the church door opened and James came outside to stand alongside her. They listened to the rumble of distant cannon and watched the flames lick the night sky for several minutes without speaking.
“Why do you suppose something this horrifying is so fascinating?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know,” she said, shivering. “I’ve been wondering how I would feel if that were my city—if Confederate guns turned Philadelphia into rubble and flames.”
The lights of distant campfires flickered in the night. The evening breeze carried shouts and laughter and the whinnies of horses from far away.
“Do you think anyone who experiences this can ever be the same?” James asked. His voice was very soft. “Will you be the same, Julia? Will you be able to return to your dinner parties and charity balls and forget this ever happened?”
She tried to imagine herself in a ball gown, whirling in Nathaniel Greene’s arms—and couldn’t. “Right now I can’t imagine that this war will ever end. Or that anyone will be alive when it does,” she said.
They fell silent again. Somewhere in the distance a military band played “Hail Columbia.” James reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out his silver flask. Flames reflected off its shiny surface as he unscrewed the cap and tilted it to his lips to drink.
“Don’t,” Julia whispered.
“Pardon me?”
She’d seen him sick on enough mornings to know that if he got drunk tonight he would wake up feeling miserable tomorrow. Aside from acting rude and ill-tempered, he wouldn’t be able to concentrate and his hands would shake—he’d be of little use as a physician.
She had gained so much respect for him after watching him with his patients and working alongside him in the field hospital all day, and she didn’t want him to degrade himself by getting drunk. She longed to stop him from destroying the better part of himself.
“I don’t think getting drunk is the answer,” she said.
“Oh, really?” he said acidly. “The answer to what?” When she didn’t reply he held up the flask. “I suppose you know why I carry this around?”
She wanted to say, Yes, it’s because of what happened in New Haven. But she remembered his reaction at the farmhouse in Sharpsburg, the deep pain she’d seen in his eyes. She wouldn’t mention the murder again.
“You’re a gifted doctor,” she said. “It’s a mystery to everyone back at Fairfield Hospital why you cause yourself such misery by getting drunk so often.”
“Have you ever tried it, Mrs. Hoffman? Would you like a little taste?” He held the flask out to her.
“No, thank you.”
“Go ahead, take a drink. I insist. Maybe you’ll be the first to unlock the mystery of why I drink.” He shoved it in front of her face. “Take a sip.”
The metal felt cold as he shoved it roughly against her lips. He tipped it up. She opened her mouth to prevent him from pouring the liquor down her chin—and because she was afraid of angering him. She swallowed, expecting the bitter taste, the burning fire of strong drink. Instead, she tasted nothing at all.
“It’s water,” she said in surprise.
“Ah! Very good. Now you’ve solved the mystery of why James McGrath drinks.”
She looked up at him.
“Because I’m thirsty, Mrs. Hoffman.”
“But …it’s not always water. I’ve seen you with a hangover on plenty of mornings. You come to work all rumpled, as if you’ve slept in your clothes, and you sit in your office with the curtains drawn, telling us not to shout. Everyone knows it’s because you got drunk the night before.”
“Don’t believe everything you hear.”
“But I’ve seen you with a hangover.”
“No. You haven’t. You’ve seen me with a migraine headache.”
“You have a tumbler on your desk with—”
“Willow bark tea. It seems to help my migraines.”
She stared at him in disbelief, struggling to fit what he was telling her with what she’d seen.
“Have you ever had a migraine, Mrs. Hoffman?” he asked. “The pain is incapacitating. It begins behind your eyes, and it feels as though a bright light is shining in your face, even when your eyes are closed. Sometimes the light begins to sparkle, adding to the pain. As the headache builds, the slightest sound, the slightest movement, intensifies the pain tenfold, until you’re nauseated with it. You can’t help vomiting. All you want to do is curl into a ball in a dark, quiet place and plead with God to make it stop. But of course you can’t do that when there’s work to be done. Laudanum helps deaden the pain, but I’m no good to anyone drugged, am I?”
“Are you telling me you don’t drink?”
“I used to. Perhaps too much at times.”
His eyes looked tired and sad as he gazed into the distance. She wondered what he was remembering. According to Hiram Stone, James had killed a man when he was drunk.
“But I don’t drink anymore,” he said, lifting the flask. “Just water.”
“You must know about all the rumors,” Julia said. “Everyone at the hospital thinks you’re an alcoholic.”
He shrugged. “So what?”
“Why do you let them think that? Why don’t you tell them the truth?”
“Because I really don’t care what everyone thinks.” He took another long drink and wiped his mouth with his fist. “Considering the way you’ve disregarded the opinions and expectations of your own social class, I would think that you, of all people, should understand that.”
“I don’t,” she said. “I don’t understand it at all.” Julia shook her head, as if to shake away the familiar image of him of as a drunkard and replace it with this new one. The pale, pain-pinched face and trembling hands she’d seen on so many mornings were not the result of his drunkenness but of an affliction that was totally beyond his control. She stared at him, his face lit by the flames of the burning town, and saw a completely different man.
“Well,” he said abruptly, “I’m going to bed. Tomorrow will be a very long day for all of us.”
Julia watched him disappear into the house and felt like an utter fool.
The next day Union troops crossed the river into Fredericksburg. When they discovered that the Rebels had moved to the heights outside the city, Yankee soldiers went on a rampage through the town, breaking into deserted homes and stores, smashing and destroying and looting.
Later that afternoon, when Julia crossed the river in an ambulance to help set up a field hospital in town, the sight of the ravaged city sickened her. Household goods—feather beds and rocking chairs and smashed teacups—lay trampled and discarded in the streets, while soldiers roamed freely through the ruined homes, stuff-ing valuables into their pockets and knapsacks. The commanding officers were doing nothing at all to stop the looting. She quickly turned away, disgusted with mankind, and set about her own work.
The doctors selected a large brick warehouse near one of the pontoon bridges for a temporary hospital and operating room. Julia helped James stock it with food and water and medical supplies, preparing for the battle that would begin the next day. She recrossed the river that night to sleep in the church in Falmouth once again.
At eight-thirty the next morning, Union troops began advancing toward the Rebel lines under the cover of fog. When it lifted, the assault began. Julia returned to the warehouse, where she could clearly hear the battle raging all day in the hills behind the city. As thousands of wounded men poured into the hospital, she learned from her patients what was happening.
“The Rebels hold the high ground,” one exhausted man told her, “yet our generals keep hurling men at them in wave after wave.”
“We’re out in the open,” another soldier added, “and the Rebels are protected by a stone wall. They’re just mowing us down like wheat as we come up the hill.”
It seemed like insanity to her. The terrible slaughter lasted all day, with nothing to show for it in the end except casualties. As night fell and the temperature dropped, the men who still streamed into the hospital told Julia that thousands more injured men lay pinned down on the hillside, freezing. They were forced to huddle beneath the dead bodies of their friends for protection, not daring to move—or they’d be shot at.
Julia had labored all day in the hope that General Burnside would be victorious, that this would be the last battle any of them would have to endure. As her strength began to give out, it no longer looked as if victory was possible. She was exhausted, both physically and emotionally. She couldn’t help wondering how James was holding up—if the stress had caused one of his migraine headaches to strike at the worst possible time. When she had a free moment, she decided to check on him.
The doctors had set up their operating rooms in the warehouse’s offices. As she neared that area, Julia heard James shouting at his fellow physicians.
“Look, the surgery is going too slowly this way. If we all split up and get the nurses to assist us, we can accomplish three times as much.”
“It’s against the rules, James. The army’s medical director specifically ordered field surgeons to work in teams of three.”
“Why don’t you go explain that to those dying men out there?” James asked. “You go tell a soldier who’s been waiting in agony all afternoon, ‘Sorry you have to die, but it’s against the rules for less than three of us to save your life.”’
“We’re just following orders.”
“Oh yeah? Well, I’m not.”
Julia watched as James began moving office furniture and lanterns around so he could set up another operating table. “Those pitiful souls who are being slaughtered out on those heights are just following orders, too,” he said as he worked. “Someone needs to call a halt to it. In the meantime, we need to take responsibility for what’s going on in this operating room. The medical director isn’t here; we are.” He moved his case of surgical instruments within reach of the table. When he looked up to tell the orderlies to bring him a patient, he saw Julia standing outside the door.
“Mrs. Hoffman, will you come here and assist me, please?”
One of the doctors held up his hands. “I can’t allow this, James. She’s not a physician.”
“She’s a trained nurse. I taught her myself. If she helps, we’ll get twice as much done, save twice as many lives.”
“Regulations require at least two surgeons to approve amputations.”
“Fine! The two of you can approve the amputations, and I’ll do all the other procedures. Okay? Can we begin?” He waited while the other two doctors huddled together, arguing over whether or not they should allow James to go ahead. Minutes passed, until he finally threw up his hands in frustration.
“I don’t have time for this. Men are dying while you two gentlemen discuss army regulations. Mrs. Hoffman …if you will, please?”
Julia moved forward into the room, too stunned by the speed of events to do otherwise. She had never watched a doctor perform surgery before. She was quite certain she would faint at the sight. But when James gripped her shoulders, his eyes searching hers, and asked, “Can you stand this, Mrs. Hoffman? Will you help me?” she could only nod.
The orderlies carried in the first patient, a boy with a gunshot wound beneath his collarbone. He couldn’t have been more than eighteen years old. James gently rolled him over to search for an exit wound, then began loosening his clothing.
“Am I going to make it, Doc?” the soldier gasped.
James laid his hand on the boy’s head. “We’ll do our best.”
Dread shuddered through Julia when she realized that “we” included her. She now shared the responsibility for trying to save his life. She knew then that she needed to pray for all the strength and courage God would give her. For this boy’s sake, she dared not faint or run away.
James showed her how much ether to pour into the copper face cone. “Keep this away from the lamps,” he warned. “Ether is highly flammable. Hold the cone firmly over his nose and mouth, like that. … Good. That’s enough.” He turned to his wooden case of surgical instruments and selected a probe. “Keep an eye on him. If he starts to come around before I’m finished, give him more.”
Julia nodded, too nervous to speak. She looked away as James maneuvered the probe into the bullet wound. She didn’t realize how quiet it was or that she was holding her breath until she heard the delicate click of metal against metal as the probe touched the bullet. James smiled faintly.
“Hand me the forceps. … Thank you. Now grab a sponge and mop up some of this blood to give me some exposure. … Good.”
She glanced at James’ face and saw beads of sweat running down his forehead and into his eyes. Julia grabbed a clean towel and wiped his forehead for him.
“Thanks. That’s much better.” A few moments later, he withdrew the forceps, gripping a bloody chunk of metal. He dropped it into a tin can that was already half full of pellets. “I’ll need one of those sutures in a minute,” he said as he swabbed the wound with carbolic acid. “The needles …with the silk thread. … Yes.” Then it was over. It seemed as though mere moments had passed. The orderlies carried the boy away and brought in the next patient as James wiped his hands.
Julia gradually began to relax, drawing courage from his confident skill and quietly stated orders. Little by little she found she could watch James work. She forgot that she was looking at blood and shattered bone and ripped muscle as she watched his hands, strong and dexterous—mending, repairing, healing. She learned to anticipate what he needed and had it ready before he asked.
As the hours passed, her legs grew weary and her back ached from standing in one place. She longed to quit and lie down, but James worked tirelessly, long after the other two doctors had sat down to rest.
When the orderlies finally stopped bringing patients, James leaned against the operating table and pulled out his pocket watch. “Twenty past midnight,” he sighed. “If the generals could stand in our place for one day, maybe this would end.” He shook his head and returned the watch to his pocket, then raised his arms, stretching his back and neck. “I need some fresh air.”
A rush of cold wind shivered through Julia as he opened the office door and stepped outside, closing it behind him. Her hair was escaping from its pins, so she pulled out the remaining ones and shook her head to let it fall freely around her shoulders. She was about to leave the office and look for a place to lie down when James suddenly opened the door again. He picked up a discarded uniform jacket he found lying across a chair and handed it to her. “Mrs. Hoffman …Julia. Put this on and come outside with me for a moment.”
She couldn’t imagine why he needed her, but thinking it must be an emergency, she quickly did as she was told. Just outside the door, James stopped her.
“Look,” he said, pointing up at the sky. “The northern lights.”
Above the river, from one end of the horizon to the other, the sky was alive with shimmering waves of light. Shades of red and green and dazzling white hung above her head like a luminous curtain. She quickly forgot the cold and her aching weariness, lost in the beauty of the heavenly aurora. She had never seen anything this magnificent in her life, nor did she believe she ever would again. She leaned against the wall beside James and silently marveled at the show.
“God gave the Israelites fire by night,” he said quietly, “to keep them from despair. Tonight He gave us this.”
She looked up at James, watching his face as he watched the lights perform their flickering dance. And suddenly she no longer believed that he had ever killed a man. James worked much too hard to preserve life. She would never believe he could end one. He hated death. She had seen him locked in combat with it tonight as if it were his enemy. The real James McGrath was this man, the doctor who was gentle and caring with his patients, who fought each of their illnesses as if it were a personal grudge match. The gruff anger and rudeness he often hid behind were a front, designed to keep people at bay for some reason. If he really had shot a man there would be another explanation for it—just as there had been another explanation for his “hangovers.”
“You did a remarkable job tonight, Julia,” he said, still gazing up at the sky. “Once you caught on, you anticipated what I needed before I asked. I’ve never worked that smoothly with anyone before, not even other doctors.”
“It could have been this way all along,” she said. “Back inWashington, too. But from the very first day I arrived, you seemed determined to drive me away—and everyone else, too, for that matter. You’ll probably push me away again tomorrow. What I don’t understand is why. Why do you work so hard to keep me at a distance?”
He turned his gaze to her, his face somber. Their eyes met. “For the same reason people keep sparks away from gunpowder.”
“I-I don’t understand.” But her heart had begun to beat very fast.
“I think you do, Julia.”
He reached out and gently brushed his fingers across her cheek. She froze. Her heart raced so fast she was certain it would burst. Then James slowly leaned toward her and touched his lips to hers. Julia’s body went weak and shivery all over, as if she had suddenly taken ill. The kiss lasted only a moment before he pulled back and looked at her again. His breath had quickened, and he stood so close she could feel it on her face. She could smell his scent and taste the lingering flavor of his lips. The kiss had been like a sip of something sweet, and she hungered for more.
As if he had read her thoughts, James suddenly took her face in both his hands and pressed his mouth to hers, kissing her as if he needed to draw life from her. She had been kissed only once before—a stolen kiss that left her feeling angry and cheated. But the way James kissed her now was every bit as wonderful as she had dreamed it would be. He buried his fingers in her hair and kissed her throat, her temple, her forehead. His beard sent shivers through her as it brushed her skin. Then his lips found her mouth again, and he kissed her long and deep.
Julia encircled him with her arms and drew him closer. Their bodies touched as he pressed her back against the wall. The sensations that washed over her as she moved her hands across his shoulders were so powerful, so overwhelming, she felt she might faint from them. She didn’t want James to ever stop.
But he did. He released her so suddenly it was as if someone had grabbed his shirt and jerked him backward.
“No…” he whispered. “No!” She saw horror in his eyes before he closed them. He bent forward, his hands on his thighs, struggling for breath. “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely. “That shouldn’t have happened. Forgive me.” Then he turned and fled into the night before Julia could speak.
She felt weak-kneed, shaken, the crush of his mouth still fresh on hers, the caress of his hands still tingling through her hair. She felt incomplete, as if an orchestra had abruptly stopped before the song ended; as if a plate of luscious food had been snatched away, leaving her hungry for more.
“No,” she whispered, just as James had done. But she didn’t mean it the way he had. She meant, “Don’t go …come back.”
She wanted his hands to caress her again, those strong, capable hands she’d watched earlier that night, working carefully, skillfully, the golden ring glinting on his left hand in the lamplight. And she suddenly realized, with the same horror as James, what they had done. He was married. She had willingly kissed a married man, held another woman’s husband, a little girl’s father, in her arms.
“Oh, God,” she murmured. Her knees gave way, and she slowly slid down the wall to the ground. “Oh, God, forgive me.”
When the sun rose a few hours later, Julia hadn’t slept. She had gone back inside the warehouse, found the quiet corner where the other nurses were sleeping, wrapped herself in a blanket, and lain down. But sleep wouldn’t come, in spite of her exhaustion. Now the nurses and orderlies had begun to wake up and move around. She heard the injured men moaning. She couldn’t force herself to move.
One of the orderlies approached her. “Mrs. Hoffman?”
She sat up. “Yes?”
“We’re getting the ambulances ready to take the wounded men to the train depot and Aquia Landing. Dr. McGrath said you volunteered to go with them on one of the evacuation ships.”
It took her a moment to comprehend what was happening. James was sending her back to Washington, separating the sparks from the gunpowder. “Y-yes. Yes, I did volunteer,” she stammered.
“We’ll be out front whenever you’re ready.”
Julia quickly gathered her meager belongings. She was glad that she was leaving, glad that she didn’t have to face James. She couldn’t forget how she had responded to him, pulling him closer instead of pushing him away. How could she ever forgive herself for coveting another woman’s husband? And James believed that she was married, too, that she, also, had betrayed her wedding vows last night.
In the ambulance, on the hospital train, on board the evacuation ship, Julia spent every minute, every mile of the journey working with the wounded soldiers. It was her punishment, meant to assuage her guilt. It didn’t.
By the time she reached Washington, Congressman Rhodes had long since departed for Philadelphia. But Julia would not allow herself to go home for Christmas. Nathaniel Greene was home. She couldn’t face him, couldn’t face her family, until she’d paid her penance in full.
For the next week, Julia spent all day and most of her spare time at the hospital, helping to decorate the wards with pines, celebrating the holiday with the soldiers, nursing the casualties from Fredericksburg until she was weak with exhaustion. All the while she dreaded the day that James would return. She held her breath every time a carriage pulled up or the front door opened.
In January, Julia overheard Mrs. Fowle telling one of the soldiers that Dr. McGrath had returned to Connecticut. “How did you hear that?” Julia asked the matron.
“Dr. Whitney told me. Besides, it’s been two weeks since a letter arrived from Mrs. McGrath. The prodigal husband finally went home.”
Julia turned away as tears unexpectedly filled her eyes. She had no idea at all what they were for.