Chapter Twelve

“But that is the way we are made: we don’t reason, where we feel; we just feel.”

~ A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court by Mark Twain, 1889

SUNDAY, JUNE 9

Annamae knew holding this man went against all propriety, and yet she did so without fear of consequences. Monty’s grief was a palpable energy radiating from his veins and into hers. Healing didn’t only consist of the right combination of medicine and methods but of human touch. Kindness. Encouragement. Patience and prayer. Monty had suffered minimal external wounds in surviving the flood, but his lacerations deep inside bled freely.

He sniffed. The hard muscles of his chest rose and fell on a sigh before his arms slipped away. As soon as there was enough space between them for her to recall how closely their bodies had touched, bashfulness overrode her compassion. She tucked stray hairs behind her ears to give her hands something to do. The other nurses moved about the tent acting as if they hadn’t noticed their embrace, but Annamae caught their sidelong glances and frowns of disapproval.

Monty wiped a hand down his face. “I apologize for my forward behavior.”

“You’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. Losing a loved one is never easy. We all need consolation from time to time.”

Except the condolences she’d offered him left her skin tingling and her arms wanting more.

Matthew’s light caresses had certainly never left her wanting. Though he was a good man, a wonderful physician, and would make a fine, honorable husband, his attention always left her confused. She’d never understood why until now.

Monty closed his eyes and gripped Ben’s hand.

She lowered her voice. “I’ll inform the crew to prepare his body for burial.”

“May I go with you? I could use fresh air.”

She nodded.

Annamae led them to the water barrel and instructed Monty to scrub with the lye soap while she did the same. The water was as chilly as the early morning air, and a miserable shiver stole through her, making her long for the warmth of Monty’s arms again. “How old was Ben, and what’s his full name?”

She flung excess water from her hands and arms as he followed her around the maze of tents to the headquarters. Monty slipped his hands into his pockets. For the first time since he’d arrived at the tent, she realized he’d changed into something that better fit his sturdy frame. “Benedict Covington. Seventeen.”

The loss of a young life hit much harder than others, it seemed.

Annamae stood in the tent doorway where Hetty Swank sat behind an actual desk in lieu of a crate and recorded the day’s notes in a logbook by lantern light. She relayed the news of Ben’s passing to Hetty, who asked if Ben had any known living relatives to contact. Annamae looked to Monty for the answer.

“His sister, Joanna, is eleven. She’s the only one of their family besides Ben to survive the flood. She’s been staying with a friend at Holt House while Ben works.”

“Has anyone informed her of his passing?” Hetty asked.

“No, ma’am.”

“Someone from the Red Cross will inform her at dawn.” Hetty said it cooly, as if Ben were merely a number on the list of deaths and all she was concerned about was being able to write a crisp checkmark beside his name in her book.

“I’m her pastor. It would be best coming from me.” Monty rubbed his toe in the dirt, aggravating the shadows made by the lantern.

“That will be fine.” Hetty made a notation next to Ben’s name and removed her glasses to rub the bridge of her nose. “Do you know if she has any relatives outside of Johnstown?”

“None that I know of,” he said.

“I’ll inform Reverend Beale to document her with the other orphans for adoption.” Hetty replaced her glasses and continued writing.

Annamae wanted to ask Hetty if she had a block of ice for a heart.

“You can’t do that. This is her home.” Monty withdrew his hands from his pockets and stepped toward Hetty, agony pleading from his features.

Hetty set her pen down. “Do you intend to care for the girl yourself?”

“I …” The defeat leeching from that one tiny word tortured Annamae. “No, ma’am.”

Hetty blew out a tired breath. “I understand this situation isn’t ideal. None of them are. But there are hundreds of surviving families in Johnstown, and the ones that included children are almost all missing at least one. Some, multiple or all. I hope a nice local family will adopt her, but it’s not likely. Those families won’t be looking to replace their beloved children. However, there are folks all over Pennsylvania and beyond willing to adopt for many noble reasons. That may be best for Joanna.”

Without replying, Monty stalked away, shoulders slumped.

Annamae thanked Hetty and followed him. “I know this is hard to hear, but Hetty is right. Folks are barely surviving as it is. They can’t afford to feed another mouth.”

“Joanna isn’t just a mouth. She’s a child who’s lost everything and deserves to be loved and cared for.”

Annamae lowered her head at the scolding. Apparently, she was no better than Hetty. “I apologize. I didn’t mean to sound callous.”

Monty ran his fingers through his hair. “It’s going to be hard enough to tell her about Ben, but to tell her she’s going to be forced to live with strangers is unbearable.”

They were halfway to the typhoid tents when he stopped in the middle of the open field. Head tilted toward the sky, he exhaled a loud breath. The full moon cast a silver glow over the sleepy landscape. Crickets chirped around them. Annamae wished she possessed the right words to lighten Monty’s burden, but nothing she thought of seemed appropriate. The chilly air seeped into her bones, but she dared not move for fear of disturbing his spirit further.

A curtain of clouds cast a shadow over the moon for several moments then lifted to reveal the orb in all its glory. Annamae crossed her arms around her middle. “‘Truly, the moon shines with a good grace,’ ” she whispered.

Monty looked at her.

“Shakespeare. When I was a girl, my dad would quote this line every time we’d spread a blanket on the ground and gaze at the stars.”

“A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

She grinned. “You know it?”

“Why are you so shocked?”

“Well, because—I mean … you’re a pastor.”

His hands, once again, fell into his pockets. “I fail to see your point.”

“It’s a strange tale of love. Unrefined.” Her cheeks heated. “Primitive.”

He chuckled low in his throat. “Ah, so because I’m a pastor, I shouldn’t read anything other than the Bible?”

She opened her mouth to reply but thought better of it and closed her lips with a click of her teeth.

To her surprise, he laughed harder. “I wasn’t always a pastor, you know.”

“You weren’t born with a tiny Bible in your hand?”

“I was ‘born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.’ ” He nudged her elbow with his. “Job five verse seven.”

She was glad to have diverted his grief even if but for a short time. “When did you rebel with Shakespeare then?”

“William was required at the university.”

She tipped her head. “You didn’t go to seminary?”

“I did. After I graduated from the university and grew brave enough to defy my family’s wishes to follow God’s calling.”

“I see. May I ask what your family wished for you?”

He rolled his tongue inside his cheek. “They wanted to include me in the family business.”

His tone said he’d spoken all he was willing to on the matter, though she was curious to know every detail. “And you? Tell me more about the man who quoted the unsuitable-for-pastors Shakespeare to his young daughter under the stars.”

Alone in this field beneath the moon, the conversation felt intimate. If she wasn’t about to freeze, she’d want to stay in this spot all night long and learn everything she could about Monty Childs.

“My mother died when I was five, so it was just me and Papa.” She smiled. “Papa was a dreamer. After a long day working at the mill, he’d come home and wash up, and then we’d eat dinner and spend nigh to half an hour stargazing. We’d talk about the places we wanted to travel, the things we wanted to do. We’d make outrageous plans for the future, like going on safari in Africa, seeing the Taj Mahal, climbing an Egyptian pyramid. My favorite was hunting for pirate treasure in Tortuga.”

“Treasure hunting? I’m stunned. Since you’re a nurse, I assumed you were born with rolled bandages in one hand and a thermometer in the other.”

She giggled at the thought. “He also used to tell me that during the first crescent moon of the month, if I took all my spare coins out of one pocket and put them in the other, I’d have good luck until the next crescent moon.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Tears sprang to her eyes as her father’s loving face materialized in her memory. “It was. We both knew there weren’t any spare coins to carry in our pockets.”

Having a normal conversation in a rugged field that days ago had been under several feet of churning water was surreal. And nice. For a few minutes, he could ignore the utter misery of the past week and pretend they were simply a man and a woman getting to know each other.

Ahead, two men exited a tent, carrying a body on a stretcher. Monty turned his back, not wanting to accept that Ben was really gone. He wanted to stay in the previous moment, pretending. “What happened to your father?”

Annamae picked at her fingernail. “He was a puddler at the Edgar Thomson Steel Mill in Braddock. For twelve hours a day, he stirred spikes of pure iron into the churning slag. His skin was tough as leather from the heat exposed to it year after year.”

Monty instantly regretted thinking this would be a normal conversation. He knew well what a puddler was. Coke and steel were how his uncle had amassed their family’s wealth.

Her hands dropped to her sides. “The Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers had been pushing Andrew Carnegie and his men to implement safety measures for their workers, but they refused. My father provided the association with insider information on working conditions while the association encouraged the workers to strike. I came home from school one day and was told by his supervisor that the brackets on the platform above the smelting pot where my father stirred had popped loose, and he’d fallen into the molten iron.”

Monty’s stomach roiled, and he flinched.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I was supposed to be distracting you from death, and I’ve brought it around full circle.”

He stared at the moon. “Unfortunately, death is part of life.”

And he’d seen more in the past week than he ever cared to see again.

“And what of your nursing?” he asked. “Where does that fall into your story?”

“I refused to believe his death was happenstance. Falling into that molten iron was his greatest fear. He told me how checking the security of the platform was the first thing he did every day. I wanted to fight the company in court, but I couldn’t prove my theory that someone sabotaged the platform so he’d cease informing the association. None of the witnesses would confess what they’d seen, fearing for their own lives and those of their family. I was sixteen. I had no money to hire a lawyer as we barely made enough to pay rent and eat.

“The company’s idea of proper condolences was three hundred dollars and an eviction notice to leave the tenement within three days. I wasn’t at liberty to stay since my father was no longer an employee. I put that money to use by learning a skill I could use to help the poor, abandoned, wounded, and forgotten.”

No doubt his uncle was the one who’d decided three hundred dollars was worth a man’s life. Carnegie had soft places in his heart and loose pockets. The idea of a young woman orphaned and homeless from an incident in his mill would have kept him up at night. That was why Carnegie had hired Henry Clay Frick to manage his mills. Uncle Henry was as hard as the steel rolling off the presses. He made sure jobs got done, no matter how unconventional the method. Carnegie didn’t ask questions. That way, his conscience remained clean.

Monty rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sorry for what you’ve endured, but I’m glad you’re here. Although Tortuga would’ve been a greater adventure.”

She grinned. “My father taught me how to navigate the stars so I could always find my way home. Keep your gaze fixed upon the One who created those stars, Monty. He’ll guide you home.”

Warmth split the middle of Monty’s chest. He’d needed that simple reminder.

Annamae craned her neck to see around him and pointed. “They’ve gone now. If you don’t start with any symptoms through the night, and you wash and change your clothes, you should be safe to find Ben’s sister after daybreak.”

“I appreciate you doing all you could to save Ben.”

“I wish I could’ve done more.” She shivered.

“You need to get warm. I won’t keep you any longer.”

“Wait.”

He shifted to face her.

“Unfortunately, Ben won’t be the last casualty of typhoid. Until the disinfectants arrive and are used, this is going to get much worse. I know you have your own responsibilities with the church, but we could use a chaplain to help ease people’s transition.”

Monty was called to lead, guide, and comfort others, even into the next life. But he didn’t think the humanity in him could bear any more death.

“I’ll consider it and let you know.”

As he walked back to the church alone, guided by the dim light of fires warming the homeless, all his mind would focus on was the panic in Ben’s eyes. All he could hear were the screams of those rushing downriver. All he could feel was the loneliness Annamae must have felt standing by her father’s grave, dressed in black, alone.

As soon as he visited Joanna, he’d search every inch of the remains of this town for Cyrus Elder. If the man had gone down, then he’d find his way to Pittsburgh and storm the ornate wooden doors of Clayton, his uncle’s estate. Someone owed him answers. Not only for the people of Johnstown but for the tender and loving nurse who very well may have saved his life.