“Nonsense, Madam!” replied the Doctor, almost rudely. “My wife expects you! We soldiers have no luxuries and but few comforts, but we can give you shelter and save General Miles some trouble in sending you to and fro!” And he started rapidly across the stone walk. I followed him in silence for some distance, hardly knowing why I did so, my mind busy conjuring up the possible significance of his conduct, and alert to meet the unknown perils into which it was possible I was being led. Presently the Doctor, between puffs of tobacco, asked, “Ever been here before?”
“Yes!” I answered, sorrowfully enough, but with some pride, too, unless at that moment I proved untrue to myself, which I know I did not. “Yes! I was here during President Pierce’s administration, when my husband was an honoured Senator, and I, beside Secretary Dobbin, looked on the brilliant rockets that wrote the names of Pierce and Davis across the night sky!” I was sad at the thought of that joyful occasion and the contrast the present afforded me. Suddenly the Doctor, who had been chewing most ostentatiously at his pipe, edged up to me and said, in a low voice:
“Cheer up! Cheer up! Cheer up! Madam!” He spoke so rapidly that I hardly realised the significance of his words. They sounded exactly like “chirrup, chirrup, chirrup, Madam.” “My wife,” he added, still in that low-guarded voice, “is the damnedest Rebel out, except yourself, Madam!”
I was dumbfounded! He, Dr. Cooper, the blackest of Black Republicans, etc., against whom I had been warned so emphatically? A flood of gratitude rushed over me. Half crying, I turned to grasp his hand and thank him, but seeing my intention, he drew away, saying sharply, “None of that, Madam! None o’ that!” and, increasing his gait suddenly, almost flew before me, his long gown rising in his wake most ludicrously, as he made for a dark cottage that now began to shape itself out of the gloom. It was so small that until we were almost upon it I had not perceived it. Every window it boasted was mysteriously dark.
My guide pushed open the door, however, and entered, I following him mechanically. The door closed behind me, and it seemed automatically, as the Doctor disappeared from view; but, in a moment, I found myself in the friendly embrace of the Doctor’s wife, one of the loveliest of women, Elva Cooper.
“Be of good cheer, my sweet sister!” she said, as her tears flowed in sympathy with mine. “You are in the right place. There is nothing under heaven you would do for Mr. Davis or Mr. Clay that I will not do. I am an Old Point Comfort woman, born here. My mother is a Virginian,” she continued, “and is with me; and you must know my little Georgette. We are all Rebels of the first water!” and this I found to be true.
This strangely God-given friend, Elva Jones Cooper, with whom I remained four days and nights, never flagged in her devotion to me and the prisoners. I saw her many times in my several visits to the Fort, and on numberless occasions had reason to note the womanly expression of her sympathy. Quite frequently she would prepare with her own hands a dainty breakfast, write on a card, “By order of Dr. C——,” and send to one or the other of the prisoners.
I once saw her gather from a box of growing violets a small bunch of flowers, tie them with a strand of her shining hair, and drop them into her husband’s hat, saying, “Put that hat where Mr. Clay can see it. He shall smell violets, even though he is a prisoner!”
Mrs. Cooper was young, not thirty; beautiful in form and face; snowy skin and raven hair and eyes; tall, commanding, and graceful. My husband, on seeing her, exclaimed, “Maid of Saragossa!” And very appropriately did he transfer to her this poetic title.
Outwardly, Dr. Cooper’s deportment to me was barely civil, and so continued. I dared not ask one favour, so stern and seemingly implacably did he deport himself toward my husband and me, toward our section and the cause for which we were suffering; yet, in the months to come, as on that memorable night of January 21, 1866, many an occasion arose to convince me that Dr. Craven’s successor, after all, was actuated by a genuine feeling of humanity toward the State prisoners, and I soon grew to recognise in him a lamb in wolf’s clothing.