The Rough Rider Read online

  © 1995 by Gilbert Morris

  Published by Bethany House Publishers

  11300 Hampshire Avenue South

  Bloomington, Minnesota 55438

  www.bethanyhouse.com

  Bethany House Publishers is a division of

  Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan

  www.bakerpublishinggroup.com

  Ebook edition created 2011

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher and copyright owners. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  ISBN 978-1-4412-7043-6

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

  To my pastor—Artie Grimes,

  Some pastors have wit. Others have wisdom. And some have a genuine love of their flock. A few have the gift of bringing the Scripture to life—and you encounter a few rare shepherds who have evangelism in their bones.

  Artie Grimes is a man in whom all these qualties are combined—and I am grateful for his leadership and his friendship. And I must add that his companion, Cathy, has made him what he is today. I hope she’s satisfied!

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  PART ONE

  Shadow of War

  1. Angel With an Accent

  2. An Open Door

  3. A Christmas to Remember

  4. Lewis Falls in Love

  5. “You May Fire When Ready, Gridley!”

  6. A Surprising Invitation

  PART TWO

  When Kings Go Forth

  7. A Painful Visit

  8. Aaron Makes a Promise

  9. A Stubborn Young Man

  10. Out of the Night

  11. A Volunteer for Teddy

  12. An Army Is Born

  PART THREE

  San Juan Hill

  13. A Fragment of Destiny

  14. Bound for Cuba

  15. On the Beach

  16. Battle Cry

  17. A Matter of Courage

  18. Deborah’s Patient

  19. After the Battle

  PART FOUR

  A Time to Embrace

  20. Heroes Return

  21. At Gunpoint

  22. “Love Is More Than a Kiss!”

  23. A Night to Be Remembered

  24. A Couple of Miracles

  25. An Odd Sort of Trial!

  About the Author

  CHAPTER ONE

  Angel With an Accent

  As Dr. David Burns walked briskly down the hall of Baxter Hospital, he glanced casually out of a window—and halted abruptly to stare at the scene that was unfolding outside.

  Two young boys had captured a rat—a large, black, evil creature. Somehow, they had managed to place a string around its neck. The one lad held the rat, while the other held the collar of a small terrier that was lunging and barking furiously at the crouching vermin. The noise soon drew a small crowd of raggedly dressed children who had gathered to watch the cruel spectacle. As the crowd grew in numbers, Burns thought sadly how tragic it was that children who should be in school or on farms found pleasure in the inhuman scene that was about to take place. “Poor tykes,” he muttered to himself. “Not much future for them, I’m afraid.”

  He quickly turned from the window as a cry went up from the waifs, indicating that the battle was on. Moving down the hall, he stopped beside one aged patient struggling along the corridor on crutches. “Are ye all right, auntie?” he asked. His voice rang with a thick Scottish burr, and the old woman looked up at him quickly at the pleasant sound of it. She was frail and her hands trembled on the crutches, but she managed a smile.

  “Yes, Dr. Burns. I’m fine today.”

  “That’s good,” Burns smiled and patted her skeletal-like shoulder. “Be sure ye take the medicine, mind ye.”

  Burns stood there chatting amiably with the elderly woman for a few moments. Early in his practice, he’d discovered that a kind word from a doctor or nurse often did more good than some medicine.

  The physician was not an impressive-looking young man. He stood no more than five feet nine inches tall, but there was a military straightness to his posture. He had a Highlander’s look about him with bright blue eyes, brown hair, and a carefully trimmed mustache. His face was thin—not handsome at all—but there was a cheerful gleam in his steady eyes that was attractive enough. He moved quickly and precisely, with no loss of movement, as he continued his walk down the long hall. He had a purposefulness about him—most likely bred by his barren boyhood in Scotland. He was no stranger to hunger and poverty, much like that which many of the poor urchins who roamed the streets of New York City experienced. Poverty in a small Scottish village was not greatly different from that found in a tenement district. It left its scars on the soul as well as its marks on the body.

  But Dr. David Burns had survived his difficult childhood and fought his way through the rigid educational system. It had been an arduous struggle, but after years of dedicated study, he finally achieved the status of M.D. Shortly after graduation, he said his goodbyes to his family and immigrated to America to build a new life. He counted himself fortunate to have been accepted on the staff at Baxter Hospital.

  Turning down another corridor, Burns glanced up and saw the head nurse of the ward, Agnes Smith, engaged in some sort of argument with a young girl. Nurse Smith was a large woman of fifty, with iron gray hair tied in a bun, and a large, broad face. She was as tough as an army sergeant and ran her phalanx of nurses and cleaning women—and indeed even the doctors!—as if she were a general. It was not strange that behind her back she was often referred to as “General” Smith.

  “I tell you that there’s no way we can send a doctor to your house. Now, off with you, girl. I’m a busy woman!”

  Dr. Burns was well aware that part of the peripheral duties of Nurse Smith was to ward off the incessant demands placed on the staff at Baxter. Every day a constant stream of men, women, and young people appeared at the door seeking medical help. And it was Smith’s job to weed out those who could be helped and shuffle off those who could not. Burns did not envy the big woman her job, for he was a kindhearted individual who found it difficult to say no to anyone in need of medical help. He paused for one moment, intending to go on, and then halted, turning as he caught a glimpse of the young supplicant. Perhaps it was the plaintive quality of her voice that caught at him. In any case, he stopped long enough to take in the bedraggled figure.

  “Please, ma’am—my ma, she’s bad taken. I’m afraid she’s gonna die!”

  The speaker was young, no more than fifteen, Burns judged. She was a small girl, dressed in a tattered dark gray dress that had been soaked by the dismal, icy rain that had been falling intermittently throughout the day. Her shoes were large, cumbersome affairs of shabby black leather, laced up over the ankles—obviously not made to grace the feet of a genteel young lady. Glancing back up, he took in the light honey-colored hair that framed her oval face, visible under the shawl she wore. Despite her bedraggled appearance, he was surprised to note that the girl was very pretty. Her large dark blue eyes held a gaze of youthful innocence. Long lashes gathered together by the rain made them more pronounced. There was a beauty in the sweep of youthful cheeks and the curve of full lips. She looked like a delicate rose, he thought suddenly, growing in the midst of a forsaken garden of vile weeds. He had often seen pretty girls like this and knew to his regret the fate of most of them in the Fourth District of Manhattan in the year
of 1896. Driven by despair and need, many of them ended up trapped in the brothels and dance halls that filled the rundown parts of the city.

  “What’s the trouble, Nurse Smith?”

  Agnes Smith turned quickly, her lips drawn tight together. She was a homely woman, with almost a mannish look, which hid a heart that was not as adamant as many thought. “This girl says her mother’s sick. I’ve told her that she’ll have to get her to the hospital to be seen.”

  “Oh, ma’am, I can’t do that!” the girl exclaimed. “She can’t get out of bed.” The voice was troubled, but clear and pleasant enough—though made desperate by the anxiety reflected in the dark blue eyes. She turned to Burns quickly, recognizing his authority. “Doctor, I’m afraid for my ma! Can’t you come and help her?”

  Burns was almost trembling with fatigue. Under normal circumstances, he was strong and active, but he had just put in three grueling days of sixteen-hour shifts. The staff was already stretched beyond its limits, and young Burns was a conscientious physician. From the very first day of his arrival at Baxter, Burns had given himself to trying to meet the never-ending stream of people needing help. It wasn’t long before one of the older doctors had snorted at him, “You’ll calm down once you’ve been in the business awhile. You can’t get emotionally involved with all these people. Just take it easy and do the best you can.”

  A square three-story red-brick building, Baxter Hospital appeared to rise like a mushroom among the shabby tenements of Five Points. Its blank facade looked out on the streets milling with ill-clad immigrants whose faces were drained white by the incessant warfare against starvation, illness, and poverty. No ornament or decoration graced the front of the building. It sat there almost glumly, glowering over the ramshackle tenements that sprouted around it. Bringing cheer and jolly times was not the function of the institution, and now Burns wished heartily that a touch of grace had been given to the edifice in its bleak setting.

  The eyes of the young physician took in the bedraggled young girl before him as he hesitated. He thought of his tidy room and longed to go get a quick meal, wash, and fall into bed for a night of long sleep. But something about the plaintive quality of the girl’s voice and the slight tremble he noticed in her lips made him pause. Pushing his shoulders back, he cleared his throat, then glanced almost guiltily at Smith. “I suppose I could go and have a look.”

  Nurse Smith sniffed and shook her head vigorously. “You’d best go home and get some sleep. You can’t go trotting around all over town. Besides, it’s not safe, Dr. Burns.”

  “Oh, I expect the good Lord will watch over us,” Burns said with a smile. He reached out and gently patted the shoulder of the head nurse. He was fond of her and not afraid to show it. Smith, at first, had been taken aback by this unaccustomed show of warmth, but she had soon come to enjoy it. She took a proprietary attitude toward the young Scottish physician and the tightness of her lips relaxed. “You’re going to kill yourself,” she complained. “Well, go on, then—but be sure to eat a good meal and come in late tomorrow.”

  “I may do that, nurse.” Burns turned to the girl and said, “Let me get my coat and we’ll go have a look.”

  “Oh, thank you, Doctor,” said the young girl, her large eyes wide with appreciation.

  Burns moved to the room set apart for the few conveniences provided for the doctors, sat down, and made his final notes for the day. When he finished, he rose and put on the heavy brown overcoat and a rounded bowler, which he set squarely on his head. Stepping back into the hall, Burns closed the door behind him, then turned and said, “Now, what’s your name, girl?”

  “Gail—Gail Summers.”

  “Well, Gail Summers, let’s be on our way. How far do ye live from here?”

  “On Water Street. It ain’t too far,” the girl said quickly, as if in apology. She wore a thin black coat that she pulled together, as it had long since lost its buttons somewhere.

  “We’d better take a cab since it’s raining.” As they stepped outside, Burns noticed the girl was trembling with cold. A harsh February wind whistled and howled through the streets. Glancing down the street, he saw a cab, then lifted his fingers and uttered a piercing whistle.

  The girl was startled at the shrill sound and turned to stare at him with alarm. “It’s all right,” Burns smiled. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.” When the carriage pulled up, Burns opened the door and nodded to her. “In ye go.” He reached out and took the girl’s arm, helping her get inside, noticing that she was almost as tall as he. When he sat down across from her, he asked, “What’s the address?”

  “I don’t know the number, but it’s right down the street from the mission across from Sixth Avenue.”

  “Go to Sixth Avenue on Water Street,” Burns called out. The coach lurched forward as the horses moved against their harness.

  “How long has your mother been sick?” Burns asked. He sat there listening as the young girl spoke of her mother’s illness. Her face was drawn with fatigue, Burns noticed, and underneath her eyes were faint shadows—the marks of one who had worked too long and too hard for her age. She had a gauntness about her, too. She was older, he decided, than he had thought at first, somewhere between that age where girlhood ends and the age where womanhood begins. Looking down, he saw her hands held open on her lap. They were reddened with the cold, but when he saw the palms, he leaned forward.

  “What’s wrong with your hands?”

  “Oh—nothing, sir!”

  “Let me see.” In puzzlement, Burns reached forward, picked up one of the girl’s hands, and though she resisted, he gently spread it open. The hand was firm and strong, but the palm was red and swollen, laced with fine lines that seemed to be infected. “What have ye done to yer hands, girl?” he asked in concern.

  “Nothing, Doctor. It’s just—” Gail Summers was not accustomed to speaking with fine gentlemen, and the fact that he was holding her hand made it even more difficult for her to talk. She looked shyly into his warm bright blue eyes, swallowed hard, then whispered, “It’s just from the work.”

  “The work? What work is that?” he asked, his voice thick with his native burr.

  “I work at the rope factory. It’s handling the fiber that does it. I don’t mind it no more,” she said.

  Burns knew that the city of New York ran partially, at least, on child labor. Youngsters of no more than six or seven had been discovered working long hours in many of the city’s factories. And now as he looked at the reddened palm of the girl in front of him, an intense anger rose in him. He had a temper, this young Scotsman, that he normally kept under firm control. But when he saw wanton abuse like this, he became deeply troubled. He shook his head, touching the scars, and said, “Ye should wear gloves, lass. I’ll see that ye get some ointment to put on them. That will help them heal.”

  “Thank you, Doctor.” Gail sat back against the seat, clasping her hands together to keep the palms hidden. She had never ridden in a carriage before, and the very act of coming to the hospital seeking help for her mother had been a test of her courage. She had watched her mother get sicker with each passing day. The women of the neighborhood had offered to help, but none of their remedies had been effective. Finally, in desperation, Gail had informed her mother, “I’m going to get you a doctor, Ma.” Now as she rode along through the streets, she felt both elated and frightened. Clearing her throat, she said, “Doctor . . . ?”

  “Yes. What is it, Gail?”

  “I . . . I ain’t got no money to pay you with.”

  Burns smiled at the girl. “I didn’t expect ye had,” he said. “We won’t worry about that.” He saw the tenseness of the girl’s body relax somewhat, and smiled. “Tell me a little about yourself. Do ye have a large family?” As the carriage moved along, he discovered that the girl had one brother named Jeb, apparently named after a Civil War general. She also had two stepbrothers and one stepsister. Burns was very quick-witted, and as the girl spoke haltingly with bad grammar, he understood that
she loved her mother and brother more than anything else. He also discovered from the manner in which she spoke of her stepfather, Harry Lawson, that the girl was deathly afraid of him.

  As the carriage turned and made its way through the fast-falling darkness, Burns glanced out at Water Street. This infamous avenue traced its way along the East River on the southern bank of Manhattan Island, and was perhaps the most notorious of any part of the great city.

  Burns, who practically possessed a photographic memory, recalled a recent article he’d read concerning the vice and crime plaguing New York. An entire paragraph now leaped into the young physician’s mind as the carriage rattled over the roughness of the streets. “If you put all the grog shops, all the houses of ill-fame, and all the billiard saloons into one continuous street, it would reach from City Hall to White Plains, a town twenty miles north, in Westchester County. Every night there would be a murder every half a mile, a robbery every one hundred sixty-five yards, six outcasts at every door, and at frequent intervals men dividing loot, eight preachers trying to convert the criminals, and thirty news-papermen to report on it all.”

  “That’s it—that’s our place,” Gail blurted out suddenly.

  “Here we are, driver,” Burns called out. When the carriage pulled up to the curb, he stepped out, followed by the girl. He paid the cab driver, then turned, saying, “Now, let’s see aboot your mother.”

  The sidewalks, even at this hour, were busy with men and women talking, shouting; and a vile, rank odor hung in the air. A few street vendors moved toward them selling bandannas, tin cups, peaches, and damaged eggs. The garbage-strewn street was full of noisy children who had gathered to watch, squeezing through the crowded streets like slippery eels. For some, as Burns well knew, the street was their only home—the gang that thrived on petty thievery and pick-pocketing.

  “This way, Doctor.”

  Burns followed the girl inside a narrow doorway and up three rickety flights of wooden stairs that vibrated under his feet. His nose wrinkled at the pungent smells of cooked cabbage, sweat, dirty clothes, and sewage as they made their way upward. There was little light, and the darkness was falling quickly outside. When they reached the third flight, the girl led him down the narrow hallway. Stopping at a door, she opened it and turned to him, her face gleaming palely in the murky light admitted by the single window at the end of the hall. “Come in, please.”