Blue Shadows Farm: A Novel

2. New Orleans Hospital—March 1865

13 March 1865 Silas Starkweather dreamed of home, especially of his mother back in Watertown, where he was born. He dreamed of helping tap maple trees this time of year and making syrup. He dreamed of the sweet smell of the sap boiling on his mother’s cookstove, and how pleasant it was. He dreamed of eating his mother’s big meals, vegetables from her garden—fresh peas and sweet corn. Buttered beets and new potatoes. Fresh meat from a farmer the family knew. He dreamed about the war and how for two years he was too young to enlist and join the other young men from the Watertown area who had marched off to join the great Union army. Lincoln’s army, they called it. He dreamed about how upset his mother had been when he told her that he had enlisted. He had talked to his pa about it, but had not mentioned it to his mother. He knew how unhappy she would be, how she would plead for him not to go. His mother had good reason for concern; already three boys from the community had been killed and would never return home. Silas was her only son. 2 New Orleans Hospital Silas heard a rustling sound, and he didn’t know if he was still dreaming or was awakening. And the smell, something sweetish he had never smelled before. Were these special flowers? He didn’t see any flowers in his dream. He heard a voice. It wasn’t his mother’s, but it was pleasant. “Can you hear me, Private Starkweather? Can you hear me?” the soft, soothing voice repeated. Silas slowly opened his eyes. A young woman dressed in white gradually came into focus. “Can you hear me?” She touched Silas on the hand. Silas looked around the long room. Everything was white: the walls, the ceiling, the bed coverings. Beds lined up one after the other, and each one occupied. “Where am I?” Silas asked. “In a Union military hospital,” the young woman said. Silas, now fully awake, heard moans coming from the bed next to him and the quiet snoring of a man sleeping in the bed on the other side of his. The smell permeated the crowded room, a clean one, but different. Not at all like the country scents that Silas knew so well. “Why am I here?” Silas managed to say. “You’ve been shot.” “Shot?” Silas was pushing his mind to recall the recent history. Slowly his memory began returning, like a haze that lifts from a country meadow on a warm summer day, revealing all previously obscured by the morning mist. He recalled the secret mission he had volunteered for. How he and his fellow Union soldiers had been toting a wagon with a mysterious cargo along a hot dusty road. He remembered seeing everyone else shot and killed. “You were shot in the head,” the young woman said quietly. “You were very lucky.” 14 New Orleans Hospital—March 1865 15 New Orleans Hospital—March 1865 Silas lifted his hand to his head, which was wrapped with a thick bandage. It still throbbed. “Lucky?” “The minié ball merely tore a little groove in the top of your head. Left most of your noggin in place.” The young woman smiled. “Doctors don’t think it did any serious damage, but we’re waiting to see. Want to see if the inside of your head was affected. You’re also lucky to have a head wound. They bleed a lot, and I’m sure you must have looked dead to those who shot you.” “How long will I be here?” Silas asked. “A few more days. Maybe a week. We want the wound to heal— and we need to know if there was any more damage. How do you feel?” “Got a headache. And I’m hungry.” “Good sign that you’re hungry. We’ll find something for you to eat.” A week later, still wearing a bandage, Silas Starkweather was discharged from the hospital and was cleared for limited duty. The nurse brought him his clothes. He pulled on his trousers and shirt. They were dusty and dirty; it was obvious the hospital didn’t have time to wash patients’ clothes. He reached into his trouser pocket and there found a folded, brown, sweat-stained envelope. The memory returned. He had found it in the dead...