I pointed to the rows of tents just past the Ferry Building—there must have been two dozen tents with red crosses on their roofs. “I think Rose may be in there. Unless—”
Alma looked toward the hospital and I knew she was deciding if she wanted to help me. “What will you do if you find her?” she asked. “Have you thought of that?”
“Bring her home,” I said.
“Home,” Alma echoed. “To that hideous place on Lafayette Square?”
“You know the house?”
Alma laughed. “Oh my, you are fresh, aren’t you? Vera, this town has a couple of dozen players that make the whole business go—same as everywhere, I expect. Your Rose is one of them. They play like they’re your great chum, so long as it serves them. All I’m saying is be careful.”
“I’m careful,” I said. But I wasn’t convincing, even to my own ear.
Alma collected her bag from the grass, the beer bottles inside rattling. “Should you find your Rose, how will you get her up the hill? There are no ambulances to spare, and until the roads get cleared, a car is pretty much worthless. You’ll need to hire a horse and wagon,” Alma said, figuring as she spoke. “That’ll take real cash, not beer. Do you have any money?”
“Some.”
“And do you know anybody with a horse?”
“I might.” Suddenly, I was confessing what I knew of Bobby.
“Well, look at that.” Alma beamed, triumphant.
“What?” I snapped.
Alma squinted, seeing what I didn’t want anyone seeing—me. “You know what”—she laughed—“I think I’d better keep an eye on you. I think I better.”
We parted then, with me having made my first real friend.
Eda Funston, General Funston’s wife, had several thousand wounded on her hands. There were hundreds waiting to be evaluated, and scores of the critical in the triage tents, and hundreds of patients laid on stretchers and cots in the several dozen tents that followed.
“I’m looking for someone,” I said.
“Everyone is looking for someone,” remarked doe-eyed Eda Funston. Dressed all in white, a pencil balanced behind each ear, she was issuing orders without ever raising her voice. I trusted her immediately. “Who is your someone?” she asked.
When I told her who I was looking for and where she would have been found, Eda Funston’s brow arched—not from any feigned delicacy regarding Rose’s occupation, oh no, but because that part of town had suffered the quake and fire worst.
“Do you know for certain she’s here?”
I had to admit I didn’t.
“Well, then, I’m afraid you’re going to have to hunt.”
She walked me to the first tent filled with patients lying in rows of cots. As Eda Funston moved, a dozen nurses and regular folk trailed behind her, waiting for a word; she ignored them.
“Now, listen,” she said, speaking slowly, as if to a not-very-bright child. “Do not disturb these patients by asking questions. Do not bother any of the doctors or nurses. Do not do anything untoward, or you will be asked to leave. These are our wounded and they are my priority. Do we understand?”
“Yes, we do.” I smiled, thinking of what the mayor had said, that if Eda Funston had been in charge of the soldiers instead of her husband, the city would not have burned.
“While you’re looking,” she said, “make yourself useful by passing a bucket of water. Offer a third of a dipper per patient, no more, and—need I say it—don’t bother with those who aren’t awake.” She looked into me, taking a final measure of my character, and smiled. “Good luck,” she said, and handed me the bucket.
I went from bed to bed, tent to tent. Most of the patients were unconscious, and I was thankful I didn’t have to bother with them. Those who were awake watched me with eyes pricked with pain—burns, mostly, and broken bones. I can see those eyes now. Their limbs and torsos wrapped in gauze—and what wasn’t wrapped I wish had been.
It took all afternoon and into the evening. I nearly missed her. She was being moved, and when at last I found her, she was in the tent with the most gravely wounded—with the patients they expected to die.
She was mummified, her face and head wrapped in soiled gauze, her body a swath of stained muslin. Her pearls and diamond rings, gone.
How did I know her? By her nails, chipped though they were. Those painted spears that even in her present state terrified me.
A nurse passing through asked, “She yours?”
I nodded.
The nurse looked at Rose, a body among a sea of hurt. “Between the burns and broken bones,” she said, “it’s a mercy she’s unconscious. The docs do the best they can, but it’s a mercy.”
“Why haven’t her dressings been changed?” I pointed to her blood-soaked bandages. “Look there, and there!” I went on, accusing the poor nurse.
“My word, miss, are you blind? Look around. And more coming every hour. We do the best we can.”
That much was obvious. Yet it didn’t lessen my belief that Rose should be getting special treatment.
“I’ll be by tomorrow to collect her,” I said.
“Collect her!” the nurse scoffed. “You’re outta your mind. This patient can’t be moved. Unless you plan on taking her to the morgue.”
A House of a Horse
When I asked in Lafayette Square had anyone seen Bobby Del Monte, one of the scruffy girls who hung around with the roughneck boys told me what had happened. A soldier had tried to enlist Monster to help with clearing the roads. Bobby wouldn’t hear of it. He bested the soldier in a fistfight, and now he and Monster were in hiding.
“Where?” I asked.
The girl’s mouth twisted as she looked me over. “Come on,” and she took off down the hill.
Which is how I came to be running after that slip of a child, her legs scissoring, her blond hair loose and unkempt, flapping behind her like a wing.
Over her shoulder, she shouted, “Girlie, can’t you go faster?”
She was no young lady; I was no young lady either. I couldn’t
