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Overview
Waking Brigid is a darkly evocative novel set in haunting Savannah, Georgia. Though the city was physically spared during the Civil War, its citizens did not come through unscathed.
Into this dark and battered culture comes young Brigid Rourke, a beautiful Irish nun. Driven by the ravages of the famine, Brigid's family chose to give the girl up to the service of the Church to ensure her survival. But in order to do that she had to reject her people's pagan ways. The Church is all she has known and she seeks to do her duty…all the while fighting the lure of her people's legacy.
Brigid's resolve is tested when a prominent Savannah citizen is cruelly murdered behind a locked and bolted door in an insane asylum. The last words of the man chilled the blood of all who heard him, and the fact that he was murdered while he was alone in the cell defies all logical reason.
What follows is nothing less than an amazing clash between the forces of good and evil—dedicated white magicians versus the entrenched devil worshippers--for the soul of a city.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781429965743 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Tor Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 03/03/2009 |
| Sold by: | Macmillan |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 368 |
| File size: | 387 KB |
About the Author
Waking Brigid is Francis Clark's first novel. Born in Savannah, Georgia, he joined the Navy after graduating college, and served in the submarine force. Following a career in advertising and magazines, Clark devoted himself to full-time writing. Unfortunately, he passed away unexpectedly in the Spring of 2007.
Francis Clark was born in what may be the most beautiful and haunting city in America–Savannah, Georgia. Stories hide in the oak trees there, and the city embraces its residents as if it’s alive (which many people swear to be true). As with most old southern families, stories are hidden in his family as well, with drunkards, suicides, and even a brothel madam balancing out Cherokees and Virginia patriots.
He attended elementary school in Savannah and was then went to Georgia Military Academy (now Woodward Academy) in Atlanta. Francis attended college at Occidental College in Los Angeles in the late 60s, majoring in drama. After graduation, he joined the Navy and served in the submarine force for six years. Following his time in the service, he embarked upon a career in advertising, where he worked as an account executive and copywriter. He then shifted to the client side, becoming a marketing communications manager. In that job he published over a hundred articles in various magazines and industry journals as well as numerous sales brochures for his clients.
After almost twenty years in the industry, he became a freelancer. During his freelance years he was an HTML programmer, a magazine editor, a freelance copywriter, and the manager of a motorcycle shop.
He had a lifelong love of two wheels and was a rider and enthusiast, fond of Buells and Ducatis. He also published numerous articles as a motorcycle journalist. In his 50s he decided to devote himself full time to writing. He attended the University of Georgia, earning an MA in English (creative writing).
Unfortunately, Francis Clark passed away unexpectedly in the Spring of 2007.
Read an Excerpt
Waking Brigid
By Francis Clark
Tom Doherty Associates
Copyright © 2008 Amy ClarkAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4299-6574-3
CHAPTER 1
Savannah, Georgia
Friday, October 9, 1874
THE dream always began the same, and, though he recoiled in terror even inside the dream, he could never escape the outcome. He was walking toward the hospital tent. Around it were men broken in battle, arms and legs smashed by rifle balls, sword cuts already infected with the filth of the battlefield. Cannons rumbled in the distance. Couriers rattled back and forth on the muddy trails of the camp. Beside the tent was the inevitable harbinger of his trade — a stack of arms and limbs sawn from men as they screamed. The Confederate doctors rarely had laudanum or whiskey to dull the patient's pain while the saw rasped its way through the flesh and bone. Cutting the bone was always the most agonizing part. Some cried out. Some just cried. The ones who screamed seemed to do the best, though the screams haunted him as they did every doctor. In his dream he would enter a tent, a vague concoction of the tents at Shiloh, Antietam, and a half-dozen lesser battles where the men of the South died for "the Cause." Someone he thought he knew handed him a saw and a scalpel. Somnolent, deadened, he walked to a table where a patient lay, his pants crudely ripped back, revealing a shattered right leg.
"Hold him," he muttered to the two Negro orderlies who stood at the head of the table, like waiters at a crude feast. As they moved to hold him down, the boy raised his head, and Gaston saw that he was young, maybe sixteen.
"You're not gonna take my laig," he cried through the pain.
"No choice, son." He repeated the litany, "It's your leg or your life."
"You're not gonna take my laig." Stubbornly repeated.
"Hold him." The orderlies tightened their grip, yet the boy struggled to raise his head.
"Butcher." He said it calmly, pronouncing judgment on the doctor.
The screaming began when he cut into the flesh with his scalpel. So much like cutting up a cow or a pig, only this flesh lived, this flesh screamed with a human voice.
Until then the dream had been true to reality, so close to what he had seen and done a thousand times, even down to his feeling of cold detachment as he sliced away a part of a man who might never feel like a man again. But then the insanity started; the tent began to drum as things fell against the canvas. The poles swayed; the oil lamps rocked with the impact. Where the objects struck, each left an imprint of blood. The tent began to sag under the strain. The blood leaked through the canvas. A seam over his head split, and shattered arms and legs fell on him. Some were mangled stumps, some putrid with gangrene, some freshly removed. Some limbs were tattered, some cleanly cut. The tattered ones betrayed the work of a soldier. The cleanly cut were the work of doctors. All the limbs fell straight at him. A putrid thigh slapped him in the face, blinding him in one eye with its trail of gore. As the limbs cascaded through the rent canvas and beat him to the floor, he saw a fervid look of victory in the face of the boy.
"Ain't gonna get me. Ain't gonna get mine."
Then Gaston was swamped in the onrush of limbs, buried in a mound of bone and blood and torn meat. He clawed madly for the surface, but it was out of reach; the tide was endless. He tried to breathe, but his mouth and nose were blocked by a putrefying gore that made him retch.
He would wake up gasping for air. The sour mash whiskey he kept by his bedside was the only thing strong enough to wash the taste out of his mouth.
It had been almost ten years since Appomattox, and Savannah once again grew rich on the cotton trade. But Gaston's dream and his memories never let him enjoy the peace and the new prosperity. He always remembered that one-half of the budget of the state of Mississippi was spent to pay for artificial limbs in 1866. That fact reminded him that for three years he had not been a doctor, just a meat cutter and an expert at the final game of triage.
He heard his boy running up the stairs.
"Doc Gaston, Doc Gaston, you needed."
Ezekiel began knocking loudly at the door; he knew the doctor was normally a heavy sleeper.
"Come on in. I'm awake."
Ezekiel's dark eyes took in the bedroom quickly. "Been havin' that dream?"
"Yeah."
"Well, you needed. Mistah Richardson took real bad."
"I'll get dressed."
"I be downstairs." Ezekiel turned to his small room to get dressed.
Ezekiel's relationship with Dr. Gaston went back eight years. He knew well enough that he had to go with the doctor to the hospital, even though Zeke was nowhere near fond of the Saint James' Ward. Saint James' was the "lockup ward" at Saint Joseph's Hospital. In the ward were those too crazy to be left on their own. What made Ezekiel specially afraid was that Saul Richardson had gone from being a respected man to someone screaming about the Devil overnight. And now it was near the black of the moon again.
"White people too smart to believe in the Devil," Ezekiel muttered as he pulled his clothes on. "They willin' to talk about him, but don't believe. He sets his traps just the same, and Mistah Richardson fall into his snare." He finished dressing quickly. Doc Gaston usually got ready too soon for him anyway.
In a few minutes they were on their way. Gaston walked steadily, though not quickly. The war years had aged him prematurely, though at sixty-two he was hardly a young man anymore. He didn't carry a bag. Saint Jo's would have everything he needed, not that they had anything to help Saul Richardson, except enough laudanum to knock him senseless. Gaston and Ezekiel walked the few blocks to the hospital in silence. The fog that often rose in the city at night enveloped them, so that the light of the gas lamps was diffused, leaving much of the street in darkness. The fog swallowed the sounds of conversation and even dulled the sounds made by the few horses and carriages abroad at this hour. The sharp tap of hooves on stone was transmuted into a dull clopping sound. As they walked through the shroud of fog, Ezekiel was concerned with his fears. Gaston was concerned with his patient.
David Gaston was one of Saul Richardson's circle of friends, not merely his doctor. They had known each other for many years. Richardson's family was part of Savannah society, and, as such, was one that Gaston frequently saw at the various gatherings. They had become close friends since the war, which had left too many empty seats for them not to have. Yet Gaston had not really been part of Richardson's daily life, any more than Richardson had been part of his. They saw each other socially, and they might play cards together on occasion. The business world of cotton factors and the medical world of doctors did not overlap to any great extent.
Richardson had begun screaming almost a month ago, on the night before the new moon. He'd been taken to the Saint James' Ward and given enough laudanum to quiet him. It had taken a large dose, three times more than Gaston usually used for an amputation. The next day Gaston had gone to see Mrs. Richardson. Her elegant home looked out over one of Savannah's many squares.
His wife had let it slip to Gaston that it was odd for Richardson to have been at home on the night it started. He had been going out to his gentlemen's club on the first or second night before the new moon since before their marriage. He had failed to attend only when pressing business had called him from Savannah. Since he had not gone two nights before the new moon, she had expected him to have gone the evening before the new moon. Instead, he had locked himself in the study shortly after dinner. His screams had brought her downstairs. When she was unable to persuade him to unbolt the door, she had sent the cook's son for the police. From that point, Gaston knew the story. The police had summoned him almost as soon as they had arrived. Mrs. Richardson could not, or would not, add anything more of substance to the story. She had not known where her husband went or for what purpose on those evenings, merely that he arrived home long after she had retired. Savannah had always been a city of secrets. That a wife did not know where her husband might be or that a husband was not precisely sure of his wife's whereabouts was merely a matter of good manners in a city whose sophistication was greater than its devotion to moral standards. Certainly few had known of the negotiations with General Sherman that assured that the city managed to surrender to his army without a shot being fired or a house being burned.
Gaston's reverie was broken by their arrival at the front entrance of the hospital. It was brightly lit as usual. He turned up the stairs of the hospital. The flicker of the many gaslights made the brick front seem to waver in the darkness. Ezekiel hung back.
"I wait for you heah."
"Come on in and go down to the kitchen, Zeke. They'll have hot coffee down there."
Ezekiel hesitated, fear gleaming in his eyes.
"Suit yourself, Zeke, but I might be a while. Besides, there's a lot more bright light in the kitchen than you're likely to see out here." Faced with such a persuasive argument, Ezekiel followed the doctor into the hospital and immediately turned down the stairs to the kitchen.
Sister Mary Francis was waiting for the doctor at the front desk, her stocky hips balanced, as always, by a rosary, a crucifix, and a heavy ring of keys. Her hands fluttered more than usual, and a strand of gray hair had escaped the confines of her wimple, a certain sign that she had been roused from sleep for the emergency. Yet none of her disarray served to lessen the stern devotion to her patients that gleamed like frozen candle flames in her green eyes.
She gave an almost imperceptible nod of her head to the doctor and led the way to the Saint James' Ward. As they walked down the long corridor to the ward, Gaston noticed an unusual number of nuns about for the hour. Whispering like black doves, they stayed in the shadows at the sides of the corridor, out of the way of the aged nun and the physician in tow. For them, what resided in the confines of the Saint James' was terrifying. It was damnation itself, the Devil come to roost. They had heard the screams in the night, and they knew that no secular potions could safeguard Richardson from that which stalked him.
"Damn you." Richardson's screeching cry echoed down the hallway the moment the heavy door to the Saint James' was opened. "Kill me and be done with it."
Gaston barely recognized Richardson's voice. It was hoarse with screaming. He looked at the nun beside him. She was crossing herself. He took refuge in clinical thought.
"How long?"
"Since just before ten."
"Have you given him any laudanum?"
Her face creased a bit more deeply. "He's too dangerous at times for many of the sisters. But he is rational much of the time. The orderlies won't go near him, even after I put the fear of God in them." She sighed. "But we did give him his dose at nine." As if on cue, the screaming from Richardson's room suddenly ceased. The sudden silence startled both of them.
The nun looked at the doctor. "As I said, he is rational much of the time."
The doctor shook his head. This case troubled him more than he wanted to admit. "So at nine you gave him the full dose I prescribed."
"The full dose."
Gaston frowned. With that much laudanum in him a man could have his leg sawn off and not have his drug dream interrupted. "Are you certain he drank it all?"
A moment's irritation at Gaston's question flickered through her eyes. She let it pass before replying in a neutral tone, "I saw him drink it. I took the bottle back from him. He ..." She stopped.
"Yes?"
"He said, 'Thank you, Sister. Better have a priest at hand. This could be my last night as your guest.' He smiled at me with a look I've seen before." She turned to the doctor. "They know when they're about to die. I know he's not really sick, but it was that look of death."
Gaston knew the look she referred to too well to question her judgment.
When they reached the door to Richardson's room, Gaston rapped on it. "Saul? It's David."
The hoarse voice came through the iron door. "I am sorry I cannot receive you any better, David. But please come inside. It's safe enough now. Regardless of what those nuns and half-witted darkies tell you, I have not become the Devil."
Gaston opened the small view hole cut in the door and looked through the grille. Richardson's face blocked the view into the room. Gaston was aghast at the changes in the two days since he'd last seen Richardson. He had the drained look of a man who was only hours from death by internal bleeding.
"But David," Richardson said, "you have to promise one thing. You have to leave when I tell you. The Devil will come for me, and I will know when he's coming. But he may get you if you're with me." A slight flash of humor passed through his eyes. "I know quite well that you think me insane. I assure you I am not, but if you fail to swear that you will leave when I tell you, I will knock you senseless the moment you set foot in this room. Then the boys can drag you out of the way of harm."
"Saul, it's me."
"David, I don't have time for politeness. Do you swear?"
He nodded. "I swear."
Richardson turned away, and Gaston reached for the door handle. "Stay here, Sister. Be ready to let me out."
She bowed her head and clutched her rosary.
A shadow darkened the viewing port. "And David," Richardson whispered, "wear a cross."
Gaston stepped back from the door, only to find a crucifix pressed into his hand. It was Sister Francis's. It was her only valuable possession. The heavy silver crucifix had been on her waist from the first day that Gaston had met her in the better days of the 1840s. He resisted taking it from her.
She pressed it into his hand. "If the Lord doesn't recognize me as one of his own without it by now, he never will."
Gaston started to put it back into her hand.
She stopped him. "If praying over a thing can make it holy, then that's as holy as you'll find. It might serve to protect you. Please, wear it."
He drew the chain up over his head until the heavy silvercross dropped down on his chest. Then he did something he had not done for years. He crossed himself.
The door opened into a room that was totally vacant except for a bed, a chamber pot, and a chair. Richardson sat on the bed. A complete view of his patient did little to reassure Gaston. Dark circles of exhaustion marred Saul's patrician face. Saul had always been thin, but now he was emaciated. His skin had the sickly white tone of the seriously ill. He was sweating feverishly. A poorly healed cut on his cheek hinted at something more, as did the cuts on his hands and abrasions on his wrists. "I'm glad you came. Sorry I can't offer you a drink, but the staff here seems somewhat lax."
Gaston grimaced at the forced humor. "Hello, Saul. How are you?"
"Uh, a little dry now. Could I have some water?"
"Sister," Gaston called over his shoulder, "might you bring us some water?"
"Of course, Doctor." Her response was muffled by the thick door.
"It's all right, David," Richardson said. "It really is. I intend you no harm. The sisters are less confused than they act. Every one of them knows what's happening here. They know it as well as I. They know who it is that I am facing."
"And who's that?"
"The Devil, a demon, a minion of the netherworld."
"Saul, I can't believe —"
Saul interrupted. "But the nuns can. They know. Look in their eyes. They know. The nurses avoid me. It is always two that come. One stays in the hall. Half the time, the one who comes in is clutching her crucifix or her rosary. Any amulet that might give them some protection."
The sound of the door opening behind him caused Gaston to turn and see a frightened nun with a carafe of water and two glasses on a tray. She set the tray down just inside the door and scurried out. A second nun held the door for her. She swiftly shut the door, and the latch clicked as the door shut. It couldn't be opened from the inside.
Gaston's nervousness was obvious, and Richardson smiled. "You're not in any danger really. I can tell when I'm about to lose control. They'll have time to get you out of here."
"Lose control?"
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Waking Brigid by Francis Clark. Copyright © 2008 Amy Clark. Excerpted by permission of Tom Doherty Associates.
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