I started Early—Took my Dog
It was not a secret but no one at the hospital spoke the truth aloud.
Henry Hopkins had lost his faith and was about to enlist as a soldier in the Union Army.
What no one knew was when.
There was consensus, a rarity at Mansion House, that Henry should not go. How to persuade him of this was not generally agreed upon, though nearly everyone appeared to believe some degree of subtlety should be employed to convince the chaplain.
“Probably get shot dead in the first charge, heroics no match for a bayonet,” Dr. Hale announced brusquely, when Nurse Hastings coaxed him to an awareness of the situation. “Better off praying over the wounded, taking care of dying boys.”
It was not surprising that Reverend Hopkins nodded, clearly ignoring Dr. Hale’s exhortation.
Dr. Foster cajoled Henry to play chess in the late afternoon, explaining he wanted a decent chance to win, which he did not have at home. Mary Foster made rounds twice a week with Henry, visiting the boys recovering from their injuries, engaging him in all sorts of logistic and theological discussions, and then begged him quite prettily to come to supper at the house Dr. Foster had leased for them, where she might serve some New England delicacies her husband might turn his nose up at and be guaranteed a game of chess with an opponent who would not sulk when faced with defeat, daring him to accuse her of lying, though they all knew Jed would eat whatever Mary served and grinned at the end of every match, so delighted to have his wife announce “Checkmate” in their firelit sitting room. Nurse Hastings achieved something previously felt to be impossible, telling constant tales of her time in Crimea, now featuring a saintly chaplain she said had saved nearly as many lives as she had herself. Matron took to following Henry about, managing to appear wherever he was, not saying terribly much but keeping a close eye on him.
Samuel Diggs, on the eve of his departure for medical training in Philadelphia, simply told Henry to follow his conscience over his heart and to bring a stout pair of boots if he went to the front.
Charlotte Jenkins, who had no time to waste, came to Emma and said, “Tell him to stay because you don’t want him to go.”
Emma nodded and said she appreciated the advice and knew she could never be so direct with Henry. Not after everything that had happened, not when he had begun to look at her again without his lips tightening in the inverse of a kiss, pressed together as if he tasted something bitter or might say something unforgivable.
She got him a puppy.
It was less intentional than she would have hoped when she had first come to nurse the Confederate soldiers, when Dr. Foster called her the Hoopskirt Assassin and had meant it more than she understood. There was no coquetry to this gift, no flirtation in the overture.
It was serendipity and prayer, it was understanding how Henry was always called to care for the most vulnerable, could only make himself vulnerable in that way.
It was a dank, rainy day and one of the camp followers Mary looked after brought in the small dog of indeterminate pedigree, shivering and wet and have wrapped in what remained of an old, much-laundered shift. Emma, startled into speechlessness, took the puppy in her arms when the woman offered it and then found she had no idea what to do with it. She was standing at the end of the hall, uncertain as she hadn’t been since she’d first arrived, when Henry stepped out from a room and walked to her.
“Nurse Green, may I help you?” he said, looking only at her face, not taking in what she held, which made it easier to extend her arms and reply,
“Take her please. Or him, I don’t rightly know,” she said.
Henry picked up the puppy from her arms and cradled it in his.
“What shall I do with it?” he asked, but she could see he already had an idea from the way he shifted the small dog in his arms so that one hand could reach to stroke the silky head gently. She knew he was capable of that, a great gentleness that matched the depths of his rage, and that he had struggled to bring them in balance. Perhaps the dog would help. Perhaps it wouldn’t.
She could tell he would love it regardless.
“I should think, find out whether we ought to say her or him, pick a name, make a place for it to sleep. Fetch a dish for water. Matron will give you something for it to eat, as long as you promise it won’t make a mess,” she said.
“You’ve thought this through,” he replied.
“It’s not complicated. Some things aren’t. It needs to be looked after and my hands are full,” she said.
“You might have given it to Mrs. Foster,” he said.
“Never tell him I said this, but she has her hands full with Dr. Foster and I do think he’d be envious of any attention she gave to a puppy,” Emma said, knowing Mary would smile and Dr. Foster whoop a gale of laughter to hear her remark.
Henry did not smile exactly, but there was a light in his blue eyes that hadn’t been there in some time.
“She still has Plum, that little stray,” Henry said.
“But Plum lives here at Mansion House,” Emma said.
“This one looks to be a spaniel,” Henry said, fondling the puppy’s soft ears.
“Is that so?”
“My uncle had a spaniel when I was a boy. A good dog, loyal, friendly,” he said.
“I hope this one will be the same,” she said. “It’s good to have a friend.”
“Another friend,” Henry said, tilting his head to the side just a bit, regarding her keenly.
Henry named the puppy Snap.
Snap quickly became the hospital’s mascot, a trusted companion, capable of bringing a boy on the brink of death through the night, a favorite of all, earning accolades from Nurse Hastings who remarked that Snap was nearly the equal of Miss Nightingale’s owl Athena.
Henry did not enlist. What his sermons lacked in grandeur, they gained in homely comfort. His old convictions did not return, but something sweet and patient and persistent as a devoted spaniel, took their place.
