Chapter 3
Then, I started figuring out what to do next.
I couldn't let him stay here like this.
Not far off, I spotted a busted-up slop cart parked in the corner.
I ran over to the ragged driver and handed him the last thing worth anything on me.
It was the other hairpin from Winifred, worth a lot.
The driver took the hairpin, weighed it in his palm, and hesitated.
I bowed and begged him. "Please, sir, I'm begging you. Help me get him to the ruined church outside the city.
"Have a little mercy."
Maybe it was because I looked so miserable, but in the end, he finally nodded.
I used every bit of strength I had, hauling Benjamin onto the cart, inch by inch.
His body was burning up, like he was on fire.
The rain poured down harder and harder.
The cart jolted and creaked through the muddy road, groaning from the strain.
I sat beside him, using my body to shield him from the wind and rain.
I lost track of time before the cart finally came to a stop.
"We're here," the driver said.
He pointed at a half-collapsed church nearby, then headed off without so much as a glance back.
I dragged Benjamin off the cart, half-carrying, half-hauling him, and got him inside the crumbling church.
Wind kept sneaking in from every direction inside the church.
The statue lay toppled on the ground, its face buried under a thick layer of dust and cobwebs.
I got him over to a spot that was a bit less damp and made him a simple bed out of straw.
Just then, he woke up.
He opened his eyes, his cloudy gaze lingering on my face for a long moment.
Then, he saw clearly it was me.
In that moment, the look in his eyes shifted.
There was no gratitude and no relief, nothing but intense, bone-deep loathing, and a shame so overwhelming, so bottomless that it couldn't get any worse.
He struggled to get away from me, but the movement pulled at his wounds, making him suck in a sharp breath of pain.
"Get lost," Benjamin growled, barely able to force the words out.
I was stunned.
Rain trickled down my hair, soaking into my neck, so cold that it stung.
But even that icy rain couldn't compare to the coldness in his stare.
I looked at him, the man I once worshipped like he was a god.
Now, he lay before me like a heap of broken mud, using all the strength he had left to push me away.
I didn't budge.
I went right up to him and crouched down.
The rain and wind howled through the crumbling church.
I stared him straight in the eye and made my vow, every word sharp and clear. "Mr. Carter, as long as I still have a breath left in me, you won't die."
With that, I stood up, took off the only warm coat I owned, and laid it over him.
His fever soaked the coat almost instantly.
He started muttering nonsense, lost in delirium.
His fever had him lost in wild, delirious nightmares.
He kept shouting, "Charge, hold the line," and calling out names that were both familiar and strange to me.
They were the men who'd fought and died with him out on the frontier.
"General Carter, we can't hold on any longer," he cried out. "The fire is so big."
His eyes flew open, terror flooding his gaze.
I hurried to hold his hand. "Mr. Carter, it's okay."
His hand was burning up, but it kept shaking nonstop.
All I could do was keep soothing him, again and again, like when I used to coax my little brother to sleep.
When morning came, the rain had stopped.
The fever eased up a little.
He finally woke up.
The first thing he did was look down at his legs.
He tried to see if they'd move, yet he got nothing.
He tried again, desperation flickering in his eyes. It failed again.
Those legs that once stormed battlefields and kicked down enemy gates were nothing but useless, lifeless stumps.
His face drained of all color in a heartbeat.
A massive, devastating despair settled over him.
He let out a guttural, animalistic scream.
He started beating his legs with his fists again and again.
He hammered his legs with all the strength he had left.
But those legs didn't even flinch, not a flicker of pain, not a single reaction.
"I'm crippled," Benjamin muttered, his eyes hollow and lost.
I walked in with a bowl of soup I'd managed to beg for, and saw him like that.
"Mr. Carter, please have some soup." I gently offered the bowl to him.
He suddenly looked up, his eyes red and fixed fiercely on me.
The next moment, he knocked the bowl right out of my hands.
With a loud crash, the earthenware bowl hit the ground. It shattered into shards.
The warm soup splattered across my clothes.
"Get out." He stabbed a finger toward the door, yelling at me. "I don't need a servant's pity. Get out."
It felt like a shard of broken porcelain had sliced through my heart, the pain sharp and piercing.
I didn't say a word.
I crouched down and silently started picking up the shards of broken porcelain, one by one.
One sharp shard cut my finger open.
Blood welled up instantly.
I popped my finger into my mouth, sucked on it for a second, and then kept picking up the pieces.
He watched me, his chest heaving, the fury in his eyes slowly fading into pain and helplessness.
I gathered up the shards and tossed them into a corner outside the church.
His wounds couldn't be left untreated any longer.
I had to buy him some medicine.
But I didn't have a single dollar to my name.
I thought of the docks.
I'd heard the work there was brutal, but they paid the most.
I headed over.
The docks were full of burly, bare-chested men.
They were hauling heavy sacks, moving across the gangplanks like it was nothing.
I was a skinny girl, totally out of place in the middle of them.
The foreman looked me up and down and curled his lip in disdain. "What's a woman doing here? Go home and do your embroidery."
I gritted my teeth, walked up to a sack, and tried to pick it up like the men, bending down and attempting to lift it onto my shoulders.
It was insanely heavy.
I used every bit of strength I had, but the sack wouldn't move at all.
The guys around me cracked up, laughing at my struggle.
"Sweetheart, this isn't the kind of place for you."
"Why not join us for a drink, darling? We'll make sure you get paid."
The dirty jokes and sleazy comments never stopped, echoing all around me.
My cheeks flushed with embarrassment, but I kept my head down and ignored them.
I kept trying, again and again.