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"No wife A h Andabrother, stillaboy"

She wondered how he’dto life this long purely with the goal of the hospital inthat if he ht

"A ail June MaidennameHarper"

She stalked his words with the pencil nub, scribbling as fast as she could in her graceless, aard script "Abigail June, born Harper That’s your mother, yes? And what town?"

"Memphis I joinedup In Memphis"

"A Tennessee boy Those are just about my favorite kind," she said

"Just about?"

She confirainst the leg of the cot, and retrieved the gas "Now, Mr Gilbert Henry, are you ready?"

He nodded bravely and weakly

"Very good, dear sir Just breathe normally, if you don’t mind--" She added privately, And insofar as you’re able "That’s right, very good And I want you to count backwards, from the nuhtly "Ten," he said, and the as lass shape of the mask "Ni"

And that was it He was already out

Mercy sighed heavily The doctor said quietly, "Turn it off"

"I’as Turn it off"

She shook her head "But if you’re going to take the ar the arht’ve said more, but she knehat he meant, and she waved a hand to tell him no, that she didn’t want to hear it

"You can’t just let him lie here"

"Mercy," Dr Luther saidto co the arm would kill him faster, and maim him, too Let him nap it out, peacefully Let his fa already, the way the broad chest rose and fell, but without any rhythth With less drive More infrequently

The doctor stood and wrapped his stethoscope into a bundle to jas to know he’s a goner," he explained, and bent his body over Gilbert Henry to whisper at Mercy "And I have three other patients--two of whoh Sit with hi" He withdrew, and picked up his bag Then he said in his normal voice, "He doesn’t know you’re here, and he won’t knohen you leave You know it as well as I do"

She stayed anyway, lingering as long as she dared

He didn’t have a wife to leave a , but he had a mother somewhere, and a little brother He hadn’t o, in the sa on a cot, scarcely identified and in pieces Maybe his father had never gotten home, or word had never made it home, and he’d died alone in a field and no one had even come to bury him for weeks, since that was how it often went in the earlier days of the conflict

One ed breath crawled into Henry’s throat, and she could tell--just from the sound of it, from the critical timbre of that final note--that it was his last He didn’t exhale The air h his nose and the hole in his side And the wide chest with the curls of dark hair poking out above the undershirt did not rise again

She had no sheet handy hich to cover him She picked up the noteboard and set it facedown on his chest, which would serve as indicator enough to the next nurse, or to the retained men, or whoever came to clean up after her

"Mercy," Dr Luther called sharply "Bring the cart"

"Coed the cart, retrieving the glassthe valves She felt numb, but only as numb as usual Next There was always another one, next

She swiveled the cart and positioned it at the next figure, groaning and twisting on a squeaking cot that was barely big enough to hold hireeted the patient "Well, aren’t you a big son of a gun Hello there, I’le or wheeze Mercy wondered if this one wouldn’t go better