Page 9 of For This We Are Soldiers
Poor, poor Mr. Lysander Locke. His eyes were half open in the same sickroom stare she recalled from times of illness in the Chambers household. She was hard pressed to remember a time she had ever been bedridden. Sick, yes, but that meant nothing on a plantation, unless you were white. She looked at the peaceful men lying there, wondering why others were born to serve.
“Pancakes and scrambled eggs, gentlemen,” she said, certain that three of the four had never been calledgentlemenbefore.
The hospital steward’s relief was nearly palpable, to Ozzie’s delight. As Colm helped the avulsed ankle into a sitting position, the burn looked on with interest. “I can’t remember when I last saw maple syrup,” he declared, pushing himself upright.
Soon the soldiers were eating. Ozzie voiced no objection when the burn asked permission to douse even his eggs in maple syrup.
Lysander Locke was more of a challenge. As Colm struggled to help him sit up, Locke sighed in a most theatrical way.
“You’d better lend a hand too, my dear miss,” the actor said.
She obliged, quietly pleased when Colm twined his fingers with hers and offered a firmer foundation to a man more substantial than the usual run-of-the-mill soldier. They hauled Lysander Locke upright. If the steward kept his fingers twined in hers a little longer than a casual observer may have thought necessary, Ozzie still had no objection. Their heads were close together too. Colm Callahan smelled strangely of camphor, which puzzled her. Camphor?
She gently released her grip on Colm and stepped back, but Lysander Locke plucked her sleeve. “Do I ask too much, my dear, to ask you to feed me? I feel so weak.”
Ozzie looked at the steward, who nodded. His eyes were full of concern, and made her wonder if she had become entirely too cynical at the advanced age of twenty-eight.
Mr. Locke is not at death’s door, she thought.
“I dislike eating alone,” her patient said as she tucked a napkin under his chin. “Is there enough for this fine young man too?” he asked, indicating Colm.
“Yes, Suh,” she said. “We’ll need another plate.”
That fine young mantook the cue and hurried to the kitchen, returning with two plates and forks. “There’s enough for all of us,” he said, taking his share and dishing a plate for her. “We can take turns feeding him.”
They did. Before long, the actor was regaling them with stories of fame and fortune in Drury Lane, and then Broadway. But it wasn’t entirely about him. After the scrambled eggs were gone, he paused in his narrative.
“Laddie, you have a faint accent that places you in New York City, and perhaps somewhere more removed.”
“Aye,” Colm said. Ozzie smiled as he blushed. Such a shy man. “The farther removed is County Kerry, which I left at the tender age of five.”
“Thence to the teeming metropolis of lower Manhattan?”
Colm nodded, his expression more serious. “You needn’t know any more.”
“But I wish to,” Lysander Locke said. He indicated Ozzie. “And so does this fair damsel, who saved us from starvation. By the way, my dear, what is your place of origin?”
“A plantation in Louisiana,” she told him. “It belonged to the LeCheminant family, but it might be in the hands of a bank now, or maybe a Yankee scalawag.”
“I see no regret,” Colm commented, his eyes lively.
“None from me, Suh.” She could have told him much more, but she didn’t need his sympathy, and she didn’t know the actor well enough to need his, either. As a house slave, she had been treated kindly enough, discounting the times Madam LeCheminant took after her with a hairbrush when Ozzie had talked back to Madam LeCheminant’s daughter. She still had scars on her back and neck.
Lysander Locke looked at them. “Here I am, stove up and wounded and relying on you both to entertain me, but you’re struck dumb!”
Ozzie glanced at Colm and started to laugh, just a quiet one, because she had been taught years ago to call no attention to herself. But she couldn’t help herself when Colm turned away, his shoulders shaking. She laughed louder, until she was leaning against the iron footboard of the actor’s bed.
“Whatis so funny?” Lysander demanded finally, with all the careful enunciation and drama he probably saved for the stage.
Colm recovered first. “It’s this way, sir. Speaking for myself, I’ve never considered myself an entertainer.” He turned his smile on Ozzie. “Miss Washington? Have you ever been asked to entertain someone?”
“I have, Suh,” she said, her voice soft. As she braved a glance at Colm Callahan, she saw a flicker of understanding in his eyes. Where it came from and how, she did not know, but it gave her courage to continue. “I was the personal slave and entertainer of Lalage LeCheminant, who was five years old, my age. If I couldn’t entertain her, I got the hairbrush for my pains.”
Colm’s smile vanished. She’d said too much and turned to go, but he touched her elbow. That was it, nothing more. She had long suspected that Colm Callahan may have had a less-than-pleasant childhood of his own. Too bad she would never be brave enough to ask about it.
She recovered as gracefully as she could, looking down at the little watch pinned to her bodice. “Dear me, Suh, I think your other patients need more flapjacks.” With all the poise she could muster, she pushed the cart down the row toward the other men.
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