Read Online Die Once Live Twice by Lawrence Dorr - Free Book Online Page B

medieval torture was like . Every time he moved his leg he felt his broken bones grind against each other and a shooting, searing pain ran through him like a sword. He lay as still as possible. Freedom from pain was his only pleasure. His brain was consumed by survival.
    Doctor Franklin came by and inspected his wound. Patrick screamed in pain, but the doctor nodded, a satisfied look on his face. “Looks like sterile pus. I guess the chlorine works on men as well as kids and animals,” he grinned at Nurse O’Reilly. “You’re faring better than the man you shot, Sullivan. Stonewall Jackson died.”
    “I didn’t shoot him. His own men did.”
    “Well, whatever. You’re the hero for causing it. Wasn’t the musket balls that killed him, anyway. Their doctor amputated his arm, but he died of pneumonia after a week. Even Stonewall Jackson can’t defeat an infection. That’s why we doctors call pneumonia the Captain of Men’s Death.”
    “How’s pneumonia kill anybody?”
    “Don’t know. Some say it’s small critters—too small to be seen—but no matter. Infection builds up in the lungs and you can’t breathe. We got no treatment.”
    “Could that happen to me? Could I get pneumonia like Jackson?”
    “No, you’ve beat the Captain this time, Sullivan. A week out and you are healing—means your body is too strong for it.”
    “Damn glad to hear it.” The doctor touched Patrick’s knee and he grimaced again. “Rebel or not, I got to feel sorry for anyone who has to suffer like this,” Patrick said.
    Franklin sniffed. “Doubt he felt your pain. They say he was hallucinating from the fevers. Nurse O’Reilly, finish up dressing the wound.” Franklin turned and moved to the next bed.
    Patrick looked at the red-haired nurse who was smiling at him. “We’ve won the war, then. Lee has lost his right-hand man and the South the soul of their cause.”
    “Then you are a hero twice over, Captain.”
    Patrick grunted, couldn’t help noticing the nurse’s luminous reddish-brown eyes. Her face was pleasant, though not beautiful like Katherine’s. As she leaned over, he also couldn’t help noticing the generous curve of her bosom. “Your name is Nurse O’Reilly?”
    “Please call me Patricia.” She touched his hand and it was the first tenderness he had experienced in six months.
    “Patricia, do you know if anyone has notified my fiancée, Katherine Lovington, of my condition?”
    “Yes,” she said with a mischievous smile. “You did. You dictated a letter to me and I posted it by courier.”
    Patrick frowned. “I don’t remember doing any such thing.”
    She hesitated, embarrassed that he couldn’t remember what he had said.
    “Yes, the fever will do that. You were very concerned about her and that she should know you will come back a whole man.” The nurse described the letter a bit more as she finished bandaging Patrick. “Of course, I had to help you with some phrases when the pain was too strong for you.”
    Patrick looked away, concerned that this woman had seen him in a moment of such weakness. “Then I am in your debt, Nurse O’Reilly.”
    “Not a bit of it.” The nurse laughed and to Patrick this sound seemed to come from a world he had lost. “I was happy to do it. I will be here for you, Captain, whenever you need me.”
    Over the next week, his pain changed. The shooting pain became intermittent, but was replaced by a deep and constant ache. Boredom was the master of the day. News of a battle stirred conversation for days, and when the Rebs won anxiety gripped the room. Patrick got to know the other invalids on the ward, particularly a lieutenant named Abel Johnson. “Still Abel, even if I’m not able,” he joked. Abel was from Western Massachusetts and had worked in the mills there since he was nine years old, nearly a decade ago. His right arm had been blown off in the Wilderness, which meant that he was incapable of millwork anymore. What he would do in place of it was