Her Hesitant Heart

chapter Nine



It was good advice, and she took it.

The week began well. When she opened the door that Monday morning, the room was already warm, coals glowing in the fireplace. She laughed to see on her desk bedraggled weeds crammed in a brown medicine bottle. There was a note, in a doctor’s dubious handwriting: “No roses in January. Rabbit brush will have to do. Good luck!” It was signed, “Major Joe Randolph, M.D., U.S.A., and other letters of the alphabet.”

When her pupils came into the classroom, Susanna wasted not a minute organizing them, although it came with an army surprise. Mystified, she watched them align themselves at desks in a way she had not considered. Three of the larger children sat in front, with some smaller ones behind, where they had to crane their necks to see her. Some boys and girls sat together, which also surprised her, remembering classrooms where boys and girls gravitated to opposite sides.

Susanna watched them until it dawned on her. They have sat themselves in order of their fathers’ ranks, she thought, amazed. Time to end that.

She stood up in front of her desk, smiling inside to see Nick Martin slip in and seat himself at the rear of the room. Some of the boys turned to look at him uneasily.

“Welcome to your classroom,” she began. “I want all young children in the front row.”

No one moved.

“I want you to move now,” Susanna said, putting some force behind her words, but not raising her voice. “Your fathers’ ranks do not matter here.”

Some students exchanged startled glances, but she had no doubt they would move. She looked every student in the eye until they did.

With help from the older boys, she arranged the younger children’s desks to one side of the room and gave them the alphabet to copy. She sat among the older children, listening to them read. By the time the bugler blew mess call, the older students had their afternoon compositions assigned, and the young children were ready for her attention.

When the room emptied out quickly for dinner at home, Nick Martin looked at her with something resembling admiration.

“What is it, Nick?”

“Nothing, Mrs. Hopkins, except maybe you don’t really need me, do you?”

She regarded him, sitting there so stolid, but his eyes alert. Susanna handed him the extra slate that she knew he had been eyeing while the little ones were writing on theirs. She pointed to the blackboard, where she had printed the alphabet. “Copy these.”

“I’m not too old?”

“No one is too old, Nick.” She smiled. “Or is it Saint Paul?”

His eyes didn’t waver. “It’s Nick. Just Nick.”

She left him there in her classroom, carefully copying the alphabet, while she hurried to the Reeses’ for lunch. She ate alone in the kitchen, because Emily was upstairs trying to coax Stanley into a nap not of his choosing. Even if her cousin was unsuccessful, Susanna knew she would remain upstairs, avoiding her.

Lunch soon over, Susanna pulled on her coat and hurried across the parade ground and the footbridge to visit Maeve, sure of a warmer welcome. Maeve opened the door, her eyes bright. She tugged Susanna inside, sat her down and brought tea.

Susanna told her of the pupils aligning themselves according to rank, and Maeve nodded. “When we change garrisons, the officers’ wives and children travel first in the ambulances, and leave us in the dust behind them.”

“It’s hardly fair. What about women or children with asthma or other ailments?”

“Too bad for them,” Maeve said. “It’s the army way. You made their little darlings move back this morning, so you might get a protest.”

“Too bad for them,” Susanna joked, and they laughed together.

She stayed another five minutes, happy to see the sergeant’s wife on her feet. “Maeve, when you feel up to it, ask your friends if they’d like to learn to read and write. There’s no reason why we can’t use my Old Bedlam classroom at night.”

“Some might protest that, too,” Maeve said.

“Then I will ask Private Benedict if we can use his classroom in the storehouse,” Susanna told her.

She strode back across the parade ground with real purpose, head down against the perpetual Wyoming wind. She mentally rehearsed her afternoon’s activities, then just stood still a moment, grateful for this chance to teach again.

No one objected to a composition on their favorite thing about Fort Laramie. She gave them ample time, and turned her attention to her littlest pupils, helping them sound out the letters they had copied that morning.

When she dismissed them after recall from fatigue, the older boys thundered out, while the girls followed more sedately, some stopping to help Susanna get the little pupils into their coats. One girl even whispered, “It’s good to have school, Mrs. Hopkins.”

“I agree,” Susanna whispered back, warmed at the shy admission.

She swept the floor and banked the fire, while Nick Martin continued to sound out the alphabet and write on his slate. When he finished, he put it on her desk and left. She looked at what he had written. “‘At, bat, cat,’” she read out loud. “Good for you, Nick.”

She thought about him that evening as she sat at the kitchen table and prepared the next day’s assignments, which would include recitation of the compositions and a preview of arithmetic. She half hoped Major Randolph would wander by to see how her day had gone, even going so far as to walk into the parlor and peer discreetly out the window, looking for him. Snow was falling and she doubted he would come.

But there was Emily, sitting in her rocking chair and staring at Susanna, while her husband snored on the settee. Susanna had felt her cousin’s eyes boring into her back as she stood at the window.

“Yes?” she asked finally, tired of the scrutiny.

Emily couldn’t look at her. “Several ladies have remarked about the time you are spending over on Suds Row.”

“I suppose they would,” Susanna said, her face warm at the criticism over something so minor. “Sergeant Rattigan’s wife had a miscarriage and Major Randolph thought she might like to have someone read to her and keep her company.”

From the shock on Emily’s face, Susanna doubted anyone had ever said the word miscarriage aloud to her before.

“Maeve Rattigan just needed a friend, and … and maybe I did, too. Maeve’s better now, but I’ll have to warn you, I am planning to start a night school to teach some of the sergeants’ and corporals’ wives to read.”

“Won’t teaching during the day keep you busy enough?” Emily said.

Susanna wondered at the desperation in her cousin’s voice, curious why the fort’s wives seemed to think she was worth gossiping over. “I’m an educator. I want to help others.”

“I think you shouldn’t” was Emily’s lame reply.

“It’s a kindness to teach people to read and write,” Susanna insisted. She left the room, angry, stood in the hallway a moment and decided to go to her classroom.

Her anger dissipated as she lit the lamp and sat at her desk, looking at the empty desks and mentally repeating the name of each student. Even though the room was cold, her contentment returned.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

She looked up, surprised. Major Randolph stood in the door in a buffalo overcoat and leather gloves, his muskrat cap pulled low.

“There’s a lot of ignorance to stamp out,” she said. Then she clasped her hands together on her desk. “Nick Martin told me he could not read or write, but he had no trouble copying the spelling words. Was he injured when you found him?”

Major Randolph started to shake his head, but stopped. “There was evidence of an old injury on the side of his head.”

“I wonder who he really is.”

“Welcome to the mystery.”

The next day was even better. Shy at first to read aloud, the older students read their compositions about life at Fort Laramie, impressing Susanna with their knowledge of the area and the Indians. The young pupils contributed their mite, which made it easy to move into a discussion of local flora and fauna. Bobby Dunklin showed a real flair for drawing animals on the blackboard.

When they came back from luncheon, the air was charged with excitement that Susanna could almost feel through the floorboards. The little ones could barely sit still.

“What has happened?” she asked. “One at a time,” she said with a laugh as every hand went up.

She called on a lieutenant’s daughter, who stood up to answer, as Susanna had already taught them. “Mrs. Hopkins, it’s the most wonderful thing!” she began, practically dancing. “A supply wagon came through with boxes and barrels from back East. Christmas is finally here!”

The story came out in an excited jumble. Apparently a boxcar had been uncoupled at a Nebraska siding and then forgotten as the snow rose higher. A high wind uncovered it and the boxcar arrived in Cheyenne, where the U. S. Army unpacked it and sent belated presents in large crates to Fort Laramie and Fort Fetterman.

“Tonight everyone will unpack what should have arrived weeks ago?” Susanna asked.

It was simple to turn these good tidings of great joy into a composition, with older children to speculate on what might be in the boxes, and the younger ones to draw possible gifts. She let them out twenty minutes early; to have kept them would have been inhumane, in her mind.

“When you come back tomorrow, be prepared to tell me whether you were right or not,” Susanna called after them. She corrected the morning’s work, humming to herself. When she finished, it was still early enough to hurry to Private Benedict’s classroom in the commissary storehouse.

He was doing what she had just finished, if the stack of slates on his desk was any indication. He looked up, his smile genuine.

“I sent mine home early, too,” he told her. “Who can think about adding and subtracting when there is greater game afoot?” He sighed. “You never know about the army. One day it’s a ten-year supply of raisins or foot wash, and another it’s Christmas presents only a month late.”

“I sent my students home early after they wrote a quick composition on what they are hoping to receive, with the challenge to share it, in writing again, in the morning,” Susanna told him.

He nodded. “I did something similar, but don’t quite know what to do with the young ones who don’t read or write.”

“They can draw. Tomorrow, while the older ones are writing their compositions, you sit with your little ones and put together one composition, with all of them contributing something to the writing.”

“I should have thought of that,” he replied, shaking his head.

“You’ll learn.”

She stayed in the storehouse a few minutes more, but the private was obviously eager to return to his own quarters and see what might wait for him there. She knew there was nothing coming for her, so she walked up the hill to the hospital, where Major Randolph stood in his office, reaching deep into a crate filled with wood shavings. As she watched, he pulled out a black box.

“From your relatives?” she asked.

“Oh, no. They disowned me after I decided to stay with the Union,” he reminded her. “I bought myself a present.”

He set the box down carefully on his desk and unhooked the latches. He lifted up the sides to reveal a microscope. Susanna gasped and clapped her hands.

“Would you even consider letting me bring my older students up here to look through the microscope at something disgusting?”

He laughed out loud. “With pleasure. I’ll find a pair of my old socks. Maybe what I had for breakfast.”

“I was thinking more of water from the Laramie River when the ice breaks,” she said.

“Killjoy.”

He looked in the eyepiece and promptly forgot she was there. Susanna left the hospital and started down the hill, pleased that the wind wasn’t blowing so hard, and wondering what compositions she would get tomorrow about overdue Christmas presents.

She was planning the rest of the week’s lessons in her mind and nearly overlooked Nick Martin, trudging up the hill. He looked so cold that her heart went out to him. She touched his arm as he passed her.

“You need to be indoors,” she said.

“That’s where I’m going,” he replied with considerable dignity. “Major Randolph tells me to clean out the ashes in your classroom and sweep the floor.”

“I wondered who my benefactor was,” she told him, pleased to see him smile.

He shivered and she waved him on, wondering how his mind worked. She stood still a moment after he passed, thinking of Maeve Rattigan with her own sorrows, and the cheerful Katie O’Leary, inured to snubs from other officers’ wives. Everyone bends and we try not to break, she told herself, looking back at the hospital and thinking about Major Randolph and the heartbreak of his life.

“I suppose no one is immune to misfortune,” she told the wind as she hurried down the hill and into the Reeses’ quarters, where Stanley was riding a new hobbyhorse, and her cousin was looking through a stereopticon, her mouth open with the wonder of it. Susanna smiled to think that in homes all over the garrison, Christmas had finally arrived.

Every student had a story to tell the next morning. Susanna set aside her routine and gave everyone an opportunity to describe new dolls with eyes that blinked, and a wind-up train with enough track to stretch from the front hall to the kitchen in a standard four-room quarters.

She wanted to compliment the Dunklins’ son on his excellent drawings of yesterday, but he was not present. She remarked about that to Emily over luncheon on new china—only three pieces arrived broken—that Captain Reese had ordered for his wife.

“That reminds me,” Emily said. “Mrs. Dunklin has invited you to a meeting at her quarters tonight.” She found the invitation, and held it out to Susanna. “She wants the parents to have a chance to meet you. Isn’t that kind? I don’t think the Dunklins have ever given even a card party before, and now this.”

“But their boy must be ill, so I wonder why she would do that,” Susanna said. She glanced at the clock. “You’re not invited?”

“No.” There was no denying the relief in Emily’s eyes, which made Susanna wonder even more. “It’s only the parents of students.” Her cousin frowned. “Does she mean to invite you to a house filled with contagion?”

“I doubt the matter is quite that drastic,” Susanna said. “Still …”

She thought about it when her older pupils were preparing their afternoon recitations and her little ones were attempting the alphabet without benefit of any help from the blackboard this time. Her mind was no easier when Major Randolph stopped by the schoolroom after her students had filed out, to invite her to accept his escort to the Dunklins’ that evening.

After spending an inordinate amount of time trying to decide between green wool and black bombazine, Susanna settled on the black, which struck her as more sober and teacherly. In one of his better moments, Frederick had remarked how nice she looked in black, with the contrast of her blond hair. Perhaps Major Randolph would feel the same way.

He did, apparently, if the look in his eyes when she opened the door to his knock was any indication.

“Mighty fine, Mrs. Hopkins,” he said.

Susanna blushed like a schoolgirl, and turned the conversation, remembering the microscope. “Have you made any earth-shattering discoveries with your microscope, Major?” she asked.

“No. A few years ago, I read a paper in a French journal about Louis Pasteur’s theory of germ disease. I thought a microscope of my own was in order, after that.”

“Why should that embarrass you?” she asked, curious because he seemed suddenly shy.

“I’ll share my little secret. I want to study germ theory in Paris with Louis Pasteur.”

“How did that come about?” Susanna asked, curious.

“My interest was always there. I was a long way through medical school before I admitted to myself that my favorite classes were the ones using microscopes, pond water and mold.”

“But you’re a good doctor of … of people.”

He bowed elaborately, which made Susanna smile. “Thank you! It’s theory that intrigues me the most, however.”

“Why didn’t you take that road instead of the practice of medicine?”

“A sensible question. After the Confederacy fired upon Fort Sumter, no one needed theory. I finished my last year of medical school in six months—we all did—and went into the army.”

“I think you should go to Paris,” she said, as he helped her into her coat. “Perhaps someone in the medical department would send you there, courtesy of the U.S. Army.”

He shook his head. “Such plum assignments require patronage in Washington, something a son of Virginia has not. I would have to do it on my own dime.”

“Well? What is stopping you?”

He seemed in no hurry to reach the Dunklins’ quarters. He stopped, obviously contemplating her question.

“I suppose nothing is stopping me. I have enough funds. Maybe when this summer’s Indian campaigns are over.”

“Only don’t do it until my teaching term is up, Major,” she said impulsively, then felt her face grow warm again. “I mean, I think you are my only ally.”

He patted her hand and started them in motion again. “You have several allies, but we could not consider the Rattigans or the O’Learys as possessed of patronage, either, could we?” He stopped again. “What are the Dunklins up to? I own to some uneasiness. You already know your students’ parents. I saw to that.”

“I’m uneasy, too,” she agreed quietly, and told him that Bobby Dunklin was home from school today, and the Dunklins had chosen to give a party, anyway.

“Let’s not take one more step toward the Dunklins’. In fact, I …”

He stopped, because Captain Dunklin opened the door, gesturing them inside. She saw through the front window that the parlor was full of people.

“No,” she whispered, suddenly fearful. But there was Captain Dunklin, w aiting.

“I’ll stay close to you,” Major Randolph promised. “What could have changed since yesterday, when you were everyone’s favorite teacher?”