Coming Home for Christmas Read online

  He thought she might be asleep, but she was still sitting in the canvas chair beside Ralph Gooding’s bed. He stood silently in the open doorway, listening to the dying man’s labored, irregular breathing. He hated it when patients died, but as he stood there, leaning against the doorframe now, he heard the quiet click of Laura’s rosary. He closed his eyes as the sound soothed him.

  After a moment, he opened his eyes, startled to see Laura’s level gaze appraising him. She had been crying, but her gaze was calm. In another moment he was on his knees, his head in her lap. She smoothed his hair, murmuring something that might not have even been words.

  “Laura, I know the mayor’s wife visited you and made you an offer,” he said into her lap.

  “She did,” Laura whispered. “I told her I would think about it.” Her fingers were gentle in his hair. “I don’t have to think about it, though.”

  “I love you.”

  Her hand stopped. “Is that the wisest thing you ever did?” she asked, after a long pause.

  Heartbroken, he knew then he had lost. He opened his mouth to say something, anything. He was overridden again, this time by Ralph Gooding.

  “Laddie.”

  Thomas raised his head from Laura’s lap. Still on his knees, he rested his elbows on Ralph’s bed. “Right here,” he said distinctly, in command of himself again because he was a surgeon first, even as his own life crumbled like the nave in San Juan Capistrano.

  “I tried to teach her. Not enough time.”

  Puzzled, Thomas shook his head. “I’m sorry, Ralph.”

  The carpenter smiled. He closed his eyes. “You worry too much.”

  Thomas shook his head again. The man was making no sense at all. All things considered, this was hardly surprising. Death had come knocking and never liked to be ignored for long.

  He sat back on his heels, loving this patient of his, this carpenter in the Royal Navy who had sailed on many a ship through many an ocean. He had never complained or mourned his lot, even as he suffered and faded. And here he was, thousands of miles from his home. Or was he? Thomas turned his head and looked out through the open door. The earthquake had crumbled a portion of the wall. Even though it was dark, and he couldn’t see it, San Diego Bay was down there; the Glenmore rode at anchor, and the sea was home to the likes of Ralph Gooding.

  Thomas turned back to his patient, forgetful that his wife was even in the room. He raised up on his knees and kissed Ralph Gooding’s cheek. “Do you want to be buried at sea? I can easily arrange it.”

  He thought for a moment that he was too late, until the labored breathing began again. “No, laddie. Find me a pretty place here. Shouldn’t be hard.”

  Thomas nodded. “I wish I could have cured you,” he whispered.

  “Ah, well. I’ve had a good time.”

  Thomas sat on the bed, taking Ralph’s hand in his. The carpenter’s breath started and stopped several times, then he opened his eyes and looked at Laura, who had pulled the canvas chair closer.

  “Laddie, tell her in Spanish…”

  “Tell her what?” Thomas asked gently, when the breathing resumed.

  “To sing the song. You wanted to hear an English carol and I taught her.” A bubbling sound came from his ruined throat. “No time.”

  Thomas looked at his wife and repeated Ralph’s request in Spanish. Her eyes turned into deep pools of sorrow.

  “I didn’t learn it all, señor. The earthquake got in the way.”

  “Sing what you know,” Thomas said, still mystified. “He doesn’t have long.”

  “He taught me for you,” Laura said. “He knew you were homesick and wanted to be away from here. He wanted me to sing it on Christmas Day.”

  “You need to sing it now,” he said softly. “For Ralph.”

  She rose gracefully to her feet. She went into their sitting room. He heard her rummaging around in the blue cupboard he had bought on a whim, almost as impulsive as their marriage. In a moment he heard the snap of castanets.

  “I’ve never heard a Christmas carol with castanets,” he murmured to Ralph.

  “Hush. Enjoy the moment,” his patient said. “Raise me up.”

  Thomas did as he was asked. He looked at his patient, seven-eighths dead, and went to the cabinet where he kept the rum. He poured a small glass for Ralph, even though he doubted the man could swallow. He couldn’t, but Ralph opened his eyes and licked the rum off his lips.

  “We did this for you, laddie,” Ralph said. He waved his index finger to a beat only he could hear.

  Laura nodded. She cleared her throat and looked down modestly, then up at Thomas. She hummed a note, clicked her castanets, then sang. Her voice was sweet, her English fractured.

  He knew the tune at once, thinking of a midnight on deck in the Arctic when he had sung that very carol to a thoroughly bored tern that had happened to land nearby, forced down by freezing rain. It had been Christmas then, too, one of many he had spent at sea.

  He wanted to laugh out loud, but he knew his wife well enough to know that would be the wrong thing, especially since her expression was so earnest.

  “I sore tree cheeps come siling een, own Creesmus Dye, own Creesmus Dye,

  I sore tree cheeps come siling een, ta dum, ta dum ta ta dum dum.”

  As Ralph watched, a half-smile on his face, she sang it again with more assurance—but no better English—employing a syncopated chatter with the castanets that would have astounded any British choirmaster. She added a solemn little dance that looked more Spanish than Mexican to Thomas, but which made him smile.

  “I don’t know any more, Tomás,” she told him.

  “Well, accompany me then, my lady,” Thomas said, and began to sing. “‘And what was in those ships all three, on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day? And what was in those ships all three, on Christmas Day in the morning.’”

  Laura twinkled her eyes at him then, and he felt his spirits rise. “‘The Virgin Mary and Christ were there,’” he sang and nodded at her.

  “‘Own Creesmus Dye, own Creesmus Dye,’” she sang.

  They went through the whole carol that way, to the syncopated click of Laura’s castanets, ending up in each other’s arms, laughing.

  “My love, say you won’t stay here, when the Glenmore sails,” he asked, his lips in her hair.

  His love gave an unladylike snort, not something one expected of a hidalgo’s daughter. “Did that old prune tell you I was staying?” she asked. “As if I would let you sail without me!” She dropped the castanets, put both hands on his face and kissed him soundly. When her lips were barely separated from his, she asked, “Will I like Scotland?”

  He gathered her close. “I rather think you will.”

  They both stopped then and looked at Ralph. Laura sighed and turned her face into his chest. Thomas kissed her hair and tightened his grip on her. “Well, Ralph, we sang you out,” he murmured. “‘Own Creesmus Dye ta ta dum dum.’”

  With tears they laid the carpenter out, washing his wasted body and dressing him in a clean nightshirt. Thomas shrouded him and wrapped him tight, then summoned two of the kitchen help to carry Ralph Gooding to the deadhouse. In the morning, he would make arrangements with Father Hilario and the presidio’s captain to find a good place for a man who had sailed the seven seas and died far from home.

  He sat a moment with Ralph in the deadhouse. He had fulfilled his final obligation to the HMS Splendid and to Hippocrates himself, in this distant land. It was time to go home, after he had dragged the Glenmore’s young surgeon through some cleansing surgery in the back country, tending Kumeyaay. He stood in the doorway a moment more, looking at the shrouded man. He gave a small salute.

  He hoped Laura would not think it strange if he reached for her even before he had blown out the candle, later that night. She must not have minded, because she was raising her nightgown over her head even before he closed the door to the sala. They made wordless love, assuaging their sorrow, celebrating their marriage, and planning fo
r a future. Warm and drowsy, she cuddled close to him, her leg thrown over his thigh, running her foot down his shin.

  “Laura, after Ralph’s funeral, Surgeon Fletcher and I will be going into the back country to check on the more remote pueblos.”

  “He is a foolish man,” she said with that former superior air of hers that he had been missing.

  “True. In a few days, I will bring him back here much wiser.” Thomas kissed her sweaty hair. “Perhaps you can arrange with the mayor’s wife for us to be the innkeepers for that final posada on the 24th.”

  “We can welcome in Maria and José?” she asked, kissing his chest. “You and I, who have no home?”

  “Who better than us?” He patted her hip. “And then we will have to sail on Creesmus Dye.”

  “You’re making fun of me,” she said, softening her accusation by running her tongue inside his ear.

  “Aye, lassie,” he replied in English, pillowing his head on her breast. “I have six or seven months to teach you English,” he continued in Spanish.

  Sleepy and satisfied, she was soon asleep. Thomas yawned and held her close, breathing in her fragrance. He hoped she wouldn’t be too seasick once they hit the Pacific rollers. But that was marriage, taking the bitter with the sweet.

  He thought about his father’s Christmus letter and smiled in the dark. He’d have to make a special trip to Carlisle to thank his brother for marrying Cora.

  O CHRISTMAS TREE

  Prologue

  Dumfries, Scotland—October 10, 1855

  Dearest Daughter,

  Like you, now that the Russians have surrendered Sebastopol, we wish the British High Command would hurry up and bring the boys home, so you could come home, too. And if you could actually be home in time for Christmas, even better, my dear—I have to chuckle here, remembering how many years my own dear father had to wait for me to come home for Christmas! I trust you will fare better, but I do understand delays. Still, weren’t we all assured that this nasty little war would end in six weeks?

  You are continually in our prayers. Your dear mother has burned enough candles in St James to ignite Dumfries—or at least they would, if there were more Catholics. I continue with my less-colorful Presbyterian prayers. Between the two of us, I believe we have the Lord Almighty surrounded. Let me assure you that your sweet Will keeps you in his prayers, too, even when he says grace over his porridge. He’s mature for an almost ten-year-old, but he misses you.

  If you have a moment, tell us more about Major Wharton, your unusual hospital administrator, since he is an American. I am less surprised than you, perhaps, that the US Army sent observers to the Crimea; such a thing is commonplace in military circles. If he is as effective an administrator as you seem to think, then we must applaud Miss Nightingale’s split-second wisdom in sending him to Soulari Barracks Hospital to straighten out the mess caused by others. I imagine she had to tug a few strings for that to happen, but I hear she is resourceful.

  We love you, we miss you. Will is my right-hand man. He accompanies me on my visits about Dumfries and likes to ward walk, when I let him. I think you have a budding surgeon in your son. Are you surprised?

  Best of Christmases to you, Lillian, even in that awful place. Your mamacita wants you to find someone there to kiss under the mistletoe, although I doubt there is mistletoe on the north shore of the Black Sea.

  Love,

  Papá

  P.S. My dearest, this is a broad hint, but I managed to find a husband in the middle of a war. At Christmas, too. Adiós.

  Mama

  Chapter One

  Lillian Wilkie Nicholls ached everywhere. As she tossed the scrub brush into the bucket and rocked back on her heels, she looked with some satisfaction down the barrack room. It had been dubbed a ward last year by Miss Florence Nightingale on a brief visit to this satellite hospital in Anatolia. One down, two miles to go, she thought, with a slight smile. Too bad I look washed out in gray.

  “And that shows how shallow I am,” she said out loud to no one, because the nearest nurse was at the other end, making beds. She looked down at the ugliest gray dress ever conceived by the mind of woman, then at her chipped nails. “Papa always told me never to volunteer for anything.”

  Lily knew he hadn’t meant any such thing. Still, even he had been taken aback when she’d arrived home in Dumfries more than two years ago, her hand tight in Will’s, and declared her intention of traveling to Constantinople with others ladies determined to Do Good.

  “I have it on good advice—Lord Aberdeen himself—that the war will not last above another six weeks,” she had told her parents. “If you can watch Will for me, I can do some good in that limited time.” That was two years ago—so much for politicians.

  By the end of the week, she’d been on her way back to London to plead her case with Miss Nightingale’s London liaison. There had been some objection to her general good looks. It had faded as soon as Lillian had said she could pay her own way, plus the way for four other nurses. Although she had known no more than most cultured ladies about nursing, her chief reference had come from Lord Aberdeen, prime minister and her late husband’s cousin—end of argument. How kind of her dead husband to continue to be useful.

  Will hadn’t minded being left with his grandparents; since his papa had died two years before, he had worn mourning clothes at the request of his London grandparents and walked slowly when he would have preferred to run. Even before the illness that had led to his death, Randolph Nicholls had been a distant figure: the perfect London gentleman, with time for clubs and horses, but not one scholarly little boy.

  True, Will had clung to Lily a long time at the Dumfries train station, until Grandpapa Wilkie, after whom he’d been named, had knelt beside him and gently pried him away. Grandpapa had promised to let him come along on doctor visits to the neighbors, Will’s idea of fun—end of another argument. Lillian had been at liberty to leave England and Do Some Good in the Crimea. After all, it would only be for six weeks.

  Lily sighed and looked into the filthy wash water, wishing herself home with her son. Trouble was, she had proved too efficient to release and had had no choice but to stay. Even now, almost three months after the Russians had surrendered Sebastopol, it seemed neither side could believe the long siege was over. British and French patients still languished in hospitals throughout northern Anatolia and across the Black Sea in Crimea. Soldiers still made their way to her hospital in Soulari. They should have been going home to England, but nothing about this nasty little war had been well organized, not even victory.

  With a groan, Lily stood up. She sniffed the air, happy to smell dinner cooking in the detached kitchen behind the barracks. A year and a half of scrubbing and carbolic had gotten rid of truly noxious odors. She smiled at the nurse at the other end of the corridor, one of the silent, efficient Sisters of Mercy from France who had arrived six months ago and spoke no English.

  “It is my hospital,” Lily murmured. “You can have it back, oh mighty Ottoman Empire. I am through.”

  Somehow, she had managed to avoid typhus and even cholera. Between death and transfers and feminine tantrums, she truly was the last remaining Englishwoman who had come to serve in Soulari; therefore, it must be her hospital.

  Any time now, orderlies would trundle in the dinner cart and she would spend the next few hours assisting those patients who needed help. For a few minutes, she could walk the corridor in peace, checking on her men, for so they were. The wounded were silent, something Miss Nightingale herself had once remarked on. Wounds and illness seemed to create their own torpor, as men rested and gathered their strength. Thank goodness at least they could do it in a warm hospital, with clean linen under them and good food coming. Lily remembered the battles of Inkermann and Balaclava, when the wounded had lain in their own blood and gore for weeks, because nothing had been ready. Those days were over.

  She walked through the wards, observing her patients and noting, with a sinking heart, their air of r
esignation. Victory wasn’t supposed to look like this and it bothered her.

  Of course, who wouldn’t be affected by it? Only this morning, the chief surgeon—Captain Pompous himself—had gone from ward to ward, reading aloud a letter from General Simpson, Lord Raglan’s successor, crowing about victory, but advising the men there would not be any transport home until after Christmas. So much for England remembering her heroes on far-off battlefields. Damn Captain Pompous anyway.

  She walked silently, smiling at the few patients who made eye contact. A former patient, long furloughed home, had remarked to her in a late-night, candid moment that most of his bunkies agreed that the hospital’s most comforting sound, even more than the food wagon, was the swish of women’s skirts through the halls, signaling that they had not been forgotten. After that comment, Lily had begged a noisy taffeta petticoat from Mama, who had promptly sent two.

  Lily observed as she walked. The wards were airy and comfortable, the beds properly spaced to receive all the good oxygen required to maintain standards, as interpreted by Miss Nightingale in one of her many dispatches to the hospitals within her jurisdiction.

  In the third ward, Lillian Nicholls realized what was missing. At first, the notion was absurd; the nursing staff would laugh her out of the building, if she mentioned such a trivial matter. Of course, none of the Sisters of Mercy spoke much English, so it didn’t matter.

  The more she thought about it, the more her resolve grew. There was time before dinner rounds to discuss the matter with the one man who might understand. A purposeful walk down a flight of scrubbed stone steps took her to his office. She knocked right away, not giving her doubts time to gather strength. A good idea in a ward was just as good in front of the hospital administrator’s door, or so Lillian reasoned.