“Take your pick, just make your stitches clean and tight.”
“Aye, General Hawkes,” Mae teased.
At week’s end Jon came to the fort from the farm. At their quarters where she and Rhys were having a simple supper alone, he appeared with James in tow. Though Mae welcomed them warmly, she sensed something amiss, as did Rhys.
He looked up from his plate and the tough cut of meat beneath his knife. “I sense a council of war.”
With a hoarse chortle, Jon sat down at the table while Mae got up to serve her brothers small beer. James looked more serious as he downed his drink in a few gulps and asked Mae for more. She grew more uneasy as her brothers exchanged a fretful glance.
“I bring news from home,” Jon began. “All continues calm in the valley, thankfully, as far as raids and such. But Coralie is wanting to move here to the fort.”
“Here,” Rhys repeated tersely, continuing his meal with a look at Mae.
James stirred as if uncomfortable in his chair. “Joanna said she’s cried since you left and claims she needs her sister.”
“Her sister is now my wife and has no time for theatrics,” Rhys told them, to Mae’s astonishment. “She’s busy being of benefit here and can’t play nursemaid.”
“Agreed, sir,” James said, clearing his throat.
Mae looked from her brothers to Rhys. A headache had turned him cross. He’d become especially protective of her since she’d been unwell lately. Yesterday she’d even been abed, unable to sew with Lucy. Rancid meat or vegetables, likely, given the stifling weather.
“If Coralie can return safely to Chatham, that might be best,” Mae told them quietly. “Hanna and Aaron and Mrs. Hurst will welcome her, and she can help with the baby once it comes.”
“I said the same.” James sat back, arms crossed. “But there’s little to no travel to Jersey at present.”
“Would that there was.” Jon took another drink. “I’m sorry to say that Coralie and Joanna don’t see eye to eye. Having her on the farm is proving more hindrance than help.”
“Joanna has been most patient and obliging,” James said. “The fault is not hers.”
Mae wanted to moan in dismay. She’d sensed the tension between Joanna and Coralie and pinned the blame on Coralie, who hadn’t fared well with the officers’ wives either. A heartbroken, homesick sister was unendurable. In truth, her own anger toward Eben Gibbs still simmered since he’d left them to deal with the difficulty he’d caused.
Finished with supper, Rhys pushed back his plate. “If she comes here, she’ll do so by working as a laundress or nurse where help is needed. If she refuses, she’s welcome to find a way back to Jersey on her own.”
“I’ll relay that to her,” Jon said. “And bring back her answer.”
thirty-five
She drew her rations as other soldiers did.
Pension information for Mary Cochron, camp follower
The next day, Coralie appeared and all but fell into Mae’s arms. Embracing her at the door of their quarters, Mae ushered her inside, where she’d been about to make mint tea.
“Hot tea? In this weather?” Coralie asked.
“I’m rather unsettled from the heat and bad rations.” Mae eyed her warily, noting her wan color and bloodshot eyes. Was she not sleeping? Still crying? “How are you faring?”
“I’ve just come from fort headquarters, where your husband read me the riot act about my being here.”
“Meaning?” Mae prodded.
“He said I’m to contribute to the fort by working in some capacity, either as a laundress or nurse. Imagine! I’m no better than a camp follower like Lucy or—”
“You helped at the hospital in Chatham.” The memory was suspect. Had her sister been gleaning information to pass to Gibbs instead?
“That was different. This is so ...lowering.”
Mae began measuring tea leaves from the tin into a creamwareteapot. “Helping the fort run more efficiently is hardly lowering. We must all do our part or become, as General Washington said, ‘a clog upon every movement.’”
